


My Best Friend Is A Ghost

by Fangirlwriting



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghosts, I’ll update the tags as I go, Jeremy is an actual ghost, M/M, but yeah he and Michael are still best friends, it's Halloween so here you go
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-01
Updated: 2019-03-11
Packaged: 2019-08-13 23:33:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 24,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16481861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fangirlwriting/pseuds/Fangirlwriting
Summary: Michael is a pretty normal teenager.  He goes to school, barely pays attention in class, gets bullied a lot due to being a loser, goes home and eats dinner with his moms, gets up again and does it all the next morning.  Except between school and dinner he goes to visit his best friend.  Which also sounds pretty normal at first, until you take into account the fact that his best friend was his age in 1995, and is still his age in 2015— because he's dead.  And a ghost.So maybe Michael's not a normal teenager.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So this is one chapter right now, and eventually will be made into more chapters, but I'm also going to finish my other story first. I just figured I had to post this tonight because, you know— Happy Halloween!

“Jeremy!” Michael called, climbing in through the hole in the back of the crumbling house.  “I have a surprise!”

Jeremy floated down through the ceiling.  “Ooh, surprises are good!” he called happily.  “Whatcha got? Is it chocolate? I haven’t had chocolate in forever!”

“You can’t even eat chocolate.” Michael said, tipping his head to the side.

“Well yeah, but it still smells _amazing.”_

“Well, this is something you can enjoy like a person who’s alive.” Michael said.  He danced around the rotting board and ducked under that one part of the ceiling that was collapsing.

Then he reached into his backpack and pulled out a record.

Jeremy gasped aloud and flew over, his hands hovering above the record.  “You got music,” he whispered in awe.

“Yeah, I finally found something older than you.  It’s Whitney Houston. You said you have that record player in the basement?”

“Yes!” Jeremy screamed happily, brushing right past the sarcastic comment.  “Cummon, we gotta play it!” he dove through the floor, as Michael took the longer route over to the rotting stairs.  He had to be careful climbing down, and skip the first step because it was completely rotted through, but he made it to the basement and over to the dusty old record player that was somehow still in working condition.

Jeremy had died in the 90s, and mostly liked oldies music, just like Michael (well, oldies for his day), but Whitney Houston was apparently his Beyoncé.  Jeremy was more used tapes than record players, but due to it being the only source of music in the house, he was perfectly alright using that instead. Therefore, as soon as he found the record player in the basement he was asking if Michael could find his favorite kinds of music on records.  Almost as if fate, Michael had found this at a garage sale a couple weeks later.

Michael put the record on the player with instructions from Jeremy, making sure not to scratch it, and set the needle on the disc.  A second later Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance With Somebody” blared throughout the basement, and Jeremy started dancing/floating around the room.

Michael laughed as Jeremy proclaimed “Hey watch, I can do a flip!” and then proceeded to hover above the floor slightly before doing a flip and landing a couple feet above Michael’s head.

Michael had met Jeremy about a year ago, completely by accident.  He’d been running from Richard Goranski and hoping he wouldn’t get pummeled to a pulp (Rich had a tendency to that to him), and had run to the backyard of a rotting old house when he lost Rich for a moment.  He’d stumbled inside the house just to be safe, and had come face to face with a kid in a flannel shirt and jeans hovering above the floor. Needless to say, Michael had screamed his head off and run out of the house—

But the day after he’d come back.  The kid, Jeremy, had apologized for scaring him and introduced himself.  He was about Michael’s age, and yes, he was a ghost. But he was actually surprisingly nice.  Jeremy the Friendly Ghost. Michael had asked how he died, and Jeremy said he didn’t remember much.  He had gotten up to go to school, met up with his best friend on the way, and suddenly he was floating in the house.  It had taken him a minute to realize he was dead, and once he did, he _freaked out._  He hadn’t known what to do, because he hadn’t been able to leave the house, but after a couple days he realized he didn’t seem to need to eat, and he calmed down a little bit.  But he’d never found out what happened to his family or friend, so Michael had made it his personal mission to find them.

It was proving to be more difficult than one would think.  According to Jeremy, his dad’s name was Paul, and his friend’s name was Sean, but Michael hadn’t been able to make much progress in finding either of them.

He had managed to find Whitney Houston records, though.

Jeremy stopped dancing after realizing he was being watched closely by Michael, who was not dancing with him.  He was probably a little too embarrassed to continue. The kid couldn’t let himself go for long, which Michael never got.  He was dead, who was going to care if he wanted to dance? No one even saw him but Michael.

“Um, so.” Jeremy said, sitting down.  “Did you bring your glasses phone?”

“It’s called an iPhone, dude, and yes.”  Michael pulled it out. “I knew it was a bad idea to show you Netflix.”

Jeremy had gotten majorly hooked on Disney shows, which drove Michael crazy sometimes because seriously, “Wizards of Waverly Place” was not that good.

“Well yeah, you’re far too busy playing video games to enjoy it.” Jeremy would say to him.

“I have to _be here_ for you to watch it.  And don’t diss AOTD, you've never even seen it.”

“I’m trying to catch up on two decades of content, I don’t have time to see everything!” Jeremy exclaimed.

“Except you pick mediocre TV shows as your content to catch up on.”

“Don’t diss my things and I won’t diss yours.”

“They’re _not_ your things!  You wouldn’t even know about them without me!”

“Shush.”

This was usually how it went, and then Michael would let Jeremy pick whatever TV show he wanted because he loved that dork.

It gave Michael the weirdest sense of pride to be able to call Jeremy his best friend.  Like he could say to Rich: “Oh, your best friends with Jake Dillinger? That’s cool. My best friend is a fucking ghost.”

If he could actually reveal Jeremy’s existance to anyone.

To be honest, he was content with these days after school he spent with Jeremy listening to Whitney Houston and watching “Wizards of Waverly Place.”

If he was _honest_ honest, it was because he’d fallen a little bit in love with Jeremy.  Not that anything could ever happen. Jeremy was from the 1990s, which wasn’t to say same sex relationships were flat out unsafe, like they were in the 40s or 50s, but Michael hadn’t even broached the subject with Jeremy about the fact that he was gay.  He had no idea how to bring it up, and no idea how Jeremy would react.

And of course there was the fact that Jeremy was, you know, dead.

He wasn’t quite sure that didn’t make him a necrophiliac.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There was already so many things that Michael hated about school, from Jeremy not being there to all of the bullies to the fact that it was school.
> 
> But School’s biggest crime was making him leave his bed.

Michael’s room was the basement of his house, and he had to admit, he had a pretty great deal with that.  He’d gotten the old TV that he now used for video games, he had a queen-sized bed, a mini fridge, and all the freedom to do whatever he wanted decoration-wise.

All the more reason Michael despised school for dragging him out of his amazing bedroom.

“Is it wintertime yet?” Michael groaned from where his head was on the breakfast table.  “I want a snow day.”

“It’s September, Michael.” Rachel said, placing a bowl of cereal in front of him.  “Now come on, eat up you’ll be late for school.”

“It could snow in September.  I’m sure it’s happened before.” Michael muttered, shoving a bite of cereal in his mouth.

“Global warming, _pulot_ ,” Analyn said.  “We won’t be getting any snow until December at least.”

Michael sighed again and finished his cereal while shooting angry thoughts in the direction of whoever had been the most in charge of ruining the environment.

Well, okay.  That was the Industrial Revolution, and that was more than one person (it was kind of the whole world), so that wasn’t really fair.  Although there were certainly more prominent countries that participated in the Industrial Revolution. Michael could blame Great Britain.  Yeah, it was Great Britain’s fault that he had to go to school today.

Jeremy said he knew more random facts than anyone else he’d ever met.

After finishing his cereal Michael rushed upstairs and pulled his signature hoodie on, brushed his teeth and grabbed his bag, along with the $5 for the stop by the drugstore later that afternoon.  Then he got in his PT Cruiser, tossed his backpack onto the passenger seat and went to the place that had the audacity to make him leave his bedroom.

School wasn’t a battle zone, but it was pretty close.  There was the aforementioned Rich Goranski to watch out for, as well as various other dumbasses who shoved him into walls and lockers— Michael didn’t even know their names, and he didn’t bother to learn.  That way, if one of them ever yelled “MICHAEL!” all loud and angry, Michael could respond with the brilliant, absolutely true comeback of: “Wow, you care enough to know my name? Because I don’t care enough to know yours.”

The only reason he knew Rich’s name was because he had once stuck a paper on Michael’s backpack that read: “Rich Goranski gave permission to beat me up.”  One nearby kid had managed to throw a punch before Michael ripped it off, but news of the paper had spread, and suffice to say that day had not been fun. Jeremy had offered to haunt all of them and when Michael had pointed out that he couldn’t even leave the house, Jeremy had offered to do it anyway.  Maybe by yelling really loud.

But the thing that was interesting about Rich was that unlike everyone else, who was just a dick, Rich seemed to feel guilty about the way he treated Michael.  Well, okay, he didn’t _stop._  He never apologized.  But every single time he was about to punch Michael or shove him into a locker or threaten to give him a swirly, there was a split second where Michael could tell he felt like a piece of shit for whatever he was about to do.  He didn’t ask him about it, he wasn’t a moron. But he was always wondering.

…

Out of Michael’s day, 4th period was the most tolerable, at least of the school part. The reason was mainly Christine Canigula.

Christine was probably the closest thing Michael had to a friend that was alive.  And by that, he meant they were lab partners in chemistry and she seemed to tolerate his presence.  But it wasn’t like he had her phone number, or they talked outside of chemistry, or she sat with him at lunch.  If Michael asked, she would probably be hard pressed to name five things she knew about him. But then again, that one time Christine was shadowing someone she introduced him as her friend Michael, so maybe they were closer than he thought.

Or maybe Christine got attached too easily.

He wouldn’t be surprised at either one.  It was probably both.

So here he was in fourth period, and she was talking his ear off.  She did that a lot. She talked to whoever was there with no filter, no need for prompting, and no need for the other person to talk back.

“So are you going to sign up for the musical?” Christine asked.  It took Michael a minute to realize that this particular question wasn’t rhetorical.

“Oh, um… no.”

“Aww, whyyy?”

“I have previous engagements for after school.”

“You’re in another club?”

“No, I just have something to do.”

Christine sighed.  “How can it be that important if you won’t even tell me what it is?”

“Ah, but does that make it less important or more important?”

Christine gave a little pout, and when Michael said nothing else, she sighed.  “Aw, you’re no fun.”

And then she bounced right back to her talk of the musical itself and how amazing it was going to be.

It was a miracle they ever got their labs done in time.

…

The second-to-worst part of Michael’s day was the free period right before the end of school.  The only thing worse was lunch, because Michael sat alone and usually at least one person hit him on the back of the head as they passed, and the school food tasted like shit.  Well, okay, that last one was only a problem on days he woke up too late to pack a lunch. (Like today. It just added an extra layer of crappiness to the whole thing.)

But free period was also undeniably awful.  The teachers didn’t bother paying attention most of the time, which left the period free for assholes to do whatever they wanted.  Usually Rich.

But even if that wasn’t the case, Michael figured free period would probably be really annoying.  Seriously, they weren’t even doing anything anymore, just let them go home.

Christine was also in his free period though, so he supposed that made it a little more bearable.

“And everyone seems to think I want to try out for Cosette, but I want to be Éponine!  I think her role would be a lot harder, I want to challenge myself. I realized lately that I don’t really do that enough.  Do you think it’s important?”

“Sorry, what?”

Christine made a little pouty lip.  “Weren’t you listening?”

“Uh… sorry, Chrissy.  Guess I got a lot on my mind.”

“Oh, whatever you’re doing after school?”

“What?  No.”

“So yes.  What is it that you’re doing that’s got you so out of it?”

“Sorry, that information is classified.  What were you saying?” he asked, which he knew would distract her.  That was probably being a little mean, but he really wanted to stop her from asking about Jeremy again.

“Oh, um… I was saying I want to try out for Éponine for the musical!”

“Éponine?  As in Éponine from _Les Mis_?”

Christine lit up.  “You _do_ know what I’m talking about!”

“It’s impossible to not _ever_ pay attention to you, Chrissy, you talk too loud.  Isn’t _Les Mis_ a little ambitious for a high school production?”

“You don’t have faith that Mr. Reyes knows what he’s doing?”

“Uh… no.  I really don’t.”

Christine waved her hand dismissively.  “Always the cynic, Michael.”

“That’s not really—”

“Hang on, I was gonna ask you something else, um… oh, yeah!  Do you think it’s important to challenge yourself?”

“I mean…” Michael shrugged.  “Change can be scary. But it can also be a really good thing.”  He spoke from experience. After all, Jeremy had been a pretty big change.

“Ah.” Christine nodded, and her voice sounded different enough that she was clearly trying to imitate someone.  “Change is good.”

Michael snorted when it clicked.  “‘Yeah, but it’s not easy.’” he quoted.  “‘I know what I have to do, but going back means I’ll have to face my past.  And I’ve been running from it for so long.’”

Christine mimed hitting him over the head with a stick, and their Lion King quoting ended when the two laughed.

So maybe they were actually friends.  Christine certainly seemed to act like they were.

The bang rang overhead as they continued speaking, and the students moved en masse to exit the classroom, then the school.

Michael got in his PT Cruiser and drove to the drugstore that was closest to Jeremy’s house.  (Well, okay, it wasn’t _actually_ Jeremy’s house, but that was what he called it.)  Michael didn’t always bring something as a gift on the day he went to visit Jeremy— which was everyday— but every now and then he did, since Jeremy usually had absolutely nothing to do.  Today, the gift was a candle.

Candles were usually what you got when you had no ideas, but hey, this one had a purpose!  He got to the house around 3:30, and went inside after a quick glance around to make sure no one was watching.

“Jeremy!” he called.  “I have a surprise again!”

Jeremy came up through the floor, and he looked a little surprised.  “Really? You just gave me one yesterday.”

“I know.  Ah-ha!” he pulled out the candle.

Jeremy snorted.  “A candle. Wow, you're a great gift-giver, Michael.”

“It smells like chocolate!” Michael proclaimed smugly, setting the candle down on the floor.

Jeremy paused before he broke out in laughter.  “That’s _awesome!”_ he exclaimed.  “You got me a chocolate scented candle?”

“You said you missed the smell of chocolate.  Come on, who’s the best best friend ever?”

Before Jeremy could give the very obvious answer, someone behind them both screamed.

Michael whirled around faster than he thought possible to see Christine standing in the doorway.

While Jeremy was floating behind him.

Christine looked about ready to bolt.

“Chrissy!” Michael yelled.  “Chrissy, wait—”

Christine turned to run, and Michael leapt forward and tackled her onto the grass of the backyard.

“Let go of me you weirdo!” Christine screamed, and okay, that stung a bit, but Michael managed to hold her down enough that she couldn’t run away.

“Calm down!” he screamed.  “Chrissy!”

“There’s a freaking ghost in the house!  You bought him a candle!”

“Yeah, I did, he wanted to smell chocolate!  That’s not exactly relevant right now!”

“This is crazy!” Christine finally managed to escape from underneath Michael only for him to grab her leg.

“Will you let me explain?” he said, trying lower his voice so no nearby neighbors wouldn’t run back here thinking he was trying to kill Christine.

Christine looked back at him, and he could see her trying to process everything that was going on.

“I— okay, fine.” Christine said, and after Michael let go she didn’t run out of the backyard screaming, so that was something.  “But this better not be some kind of cult or something.”

They both went back inside, Christine being very hesitant.  She still looked scared.

“Christine,” Michael said slowly once they both made it in.  “This is Jeremy. Jeremy, I’ve told you about Christine, right?”

Jeremy nodded, looking a little guilty to have scared her.  He waved awkwardly. “Um… h-hi.”

“I have to admit, this isn’t how I imagined you’d react if you ever found out about Jeremy,” Michael said to Christine.

“He’s… an actual ghost.” Christine said, walking forward.  “I mean— you read about people figuring out this stuff is true, but you never expect to actually—”  She approached Jeremy and waved a hand through his torso.

“Ahh-ahhh, d-don’t do that,” Jeremy said, flying quickly backwards.  “It gives me the shivers.” He shivered to prove his point.

“Okay, start talking.” Christine said to Michael.  “How did you find out about him?”

“Um, I’m standing right here, you can ask me.” Jeremy mumbled, crossing his arms with a roll of his eyes.  He was quiet enough that Michael was pretty sure only he could hear him.

“How did you find me?” Michael asked.

“My house is across the street.” Christine said, pointing in the direction she was referring to.  “I was listening to Les Misérables music and looking out the window when I saw you sneaking into the house across the street that should be torn down by now.”

“Hey!” Jeremy called.

“Is this what you do everyday after school?”

“Uh… yes?” Michael said.  He and Jeremy took the next couple minutes to explain to her how they had met, everything they knew about Jeremy from why they though he couldn’t leave the house to their theories on how he’d ended up in it, and right down to Michael originally having screamed and run out of the house in a similar fashion to Christine.

Christine was quiet for a minute when he finished.  “So, why did you never tell me before?” she asked eventually.

“Huh?”

“I mean, I probably wouldn’t have believed you and I probably would have freaked out like I just did, but this is _cool!”_

“I mean…” Michael shrugged.  “We weren’t really close enough to warrant me telling you?”

“What?” Christine asked, and she actually sounded hurt.  “What is that supposed to mean? We talk to each other! I like you!  Do you not enjoy talking to me?”

“N— no, of course I do!” Michael exclaimed.  “It’s just, no one can find out about Jeremy, or else we risk—”

“Someone tearing down the house, or performing an exorcism, or bringing a bunch of scientists in to perform tests…” Jeremy muttered, counting them off on his fingers.

Christine sighed. “Okay, that’s a good point.”  She glanced over at Michael.  “Sorry I called you a weirdo.”  The next second she lit up. “But I can totally come back here now, right?”

Michael and Jeremy exchanged a look, and Michael shrugged.  “Yeah, sure.”

“Yes!” Christine did a fist pump.  “So anyway, I’m Christine!” she stuck her hand out, which Jeremy stared at for a minute before looking back up at her.

“Oh, right.” Christine realized.  “You can’t—” she laughed awkwardly and put her hand down.  “I mean, I probably can’t come every day, because I have play rehearsal, and I just _cannot_ give up on play rehearsal.  But I can probably come after dinner.  And Michael can come in the afternoon, so you won’t be lonely then either.  I mean, that still leaves the morning and night, but—”

“I am well used to being alone, trust me.” Jeremy said, rubbing the back of his neck.  Yeah, before Michael had shown up, he hadn’t even seen anyone in over a decade.

“I can’t believe I never knew that was your house.” Michael said, looking towards where the house would be visible if not blocked by the front of the one they were in.  “I’ve been coming here for about a year, how have I never seen you before?”

“I usually don’t get home until at least 6PM.” Christine said.  “I have—”

“Play rehearsal.” Michael said with a fond chuckle.

Christine smiled.  “Yep. But auditions are tomorrow, so Mr. Reyes told me to go home and rest.”

“Well good luck with that.  Tonight there will be a ghost haunting your dreams.” Michael said, wiggling his fingers.

“No, I— I would never haunt someone!” Jeremy exclaimed.

“You’ve offered to haunt everyone who bullies me.” Michael pointed out.

“Aww… that’s cute.” Christine said, folding her hands.

Jeremy laughed nervously as his face went bright red.

“Dude, why are you so nervous?  It’s okay.” Michael said. “Christine is cool, I know her.”

“I’m always nervous around new people.” Jeremy said so Christine couldn’t hear.

_Oh yeah._ Michael realized.  That part was true. It had taken Jeremy almost a month to warm up to Michael.

“I probably should go home.” Christine said.  “I didn’t schedule my day for meeting a ghost, and I do need to be rested up for auditions tomorrow.  Is that okay?”

“That’s fine.” Michael said.  “I’ll see you in school?”

“Yep!” Christine called happily, before waving and running out the back door.

“So…” Jeremy said slowly.  “That just happened.”

“Yep.” Michael said.

“Are you sure she won’t tell anyone?”

“Yeah, we can trust her.  I’m sure of it. Come on, let’s light this candle.” Michael said, and then he paused.  “That’s usually something people say when they’re about to do something big, but in our case we are actually lighting a candle.”

“Oh my God, we’re so lame.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: I wrote the part about ‘no snow days until December’ on a snow day in November.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Christine is really good at planning things to make people happy. Jeremy is lonely at night, so the natural solution is a sleepover.

Christine sat at his lunch table the next day.  There was no announcement and no fanfare, she just sat down and said: “Hey, so did you know there’s a really good view of the sunset from the house?”

“Huh?”

“Jeremy says he watches it every day.  There’s a hole in the roof up in the attic that humans can’t really get to, but he can poke his head out, he says the house doesn’t stop him.  He can watch the sunset, or the stars later in the night. Do you want to have a sleepover?”

“Uh… what?”  Michael was still a little surprised by the fact that Christine had just sat down there and still hadn’t seemed to reference what she’d done at all.

“At the house.  We could tell my mom that I’m at your house, your mom that you’re at my house, and then we could both be across the street from my house.”

“You… wow.” Michael said as his brain finally caught up with what was happening.

“What?”

“I never took you as the ‘lie to my parents’ type.”

Christine waved her hand dismissively.  “Oh come on, everyone does it sometimes.  Besides, it’s not like we’re doing anything dangerous.”

“Instead of hanging around in a rotting house.”

“Bah.” Christine waved her hand again.  “There are far more dangerous things. Besides, Jeremy said last night as I was leaving that the loneliest time of day for him is nighttime, so I figured we could use the ‘project’ excuse and have a sleepover over there.”

Michael had no idea how he felt about the fact that Jeremy had never told him this before or that he had told Christine such after knowing her for less than a day, but he could let that go.  After all, he hadn’t ever asked.

“Um, okay.  Yeah, okay. I can do that.  When do you want to do this?”

“Tomorrow night, since it’s Friday?” Christine said.  “Come to my house at 6, in your car so it looks like we’re going to your house, and then we’ll drive around the block a couple times before heading back.”

“Yeah, alright.  Are we telling Jeremy about this or are we going to surprise him?”

“You know him best.”

Michael hummed in thought.  “I think he likes his surprises to be somewhat planned.  If we both show up and he’s not expecting it we could freak him out.  We should probably just tell him. I can do that today.”

“Okay.” Christine said.  “Why do you think Jeremy’s a ghost, anyway?”

“We didn’t tell you that yesterday?”

“Uh… you might’ve.  I dunno, it was a lot of information to take in at once.”

“We kinda narrowed it down to ‘unfinished business,’ as cliché as that sounds.  Only problem is, Jeremy can’t think of any unfinished business that he might have had, so we figured it’s probably tied to how he died, which he doesn’t remember.”

“Ugh.”

“Yeah.”

And suddenly Christine was talking excitedly about her audition for Eponine.  “I practiced all of last night. Oh, here, let me show you—”

“Uh, how about—” Michael shoved a hand over Christine’s mouth.  “We don’t break into song in the middle of the cafeteria? Enough people beat me up already.”

Christine’s face shifted to concerned.  “You should probably talk to someone about that.  Maybe the principal?”

“You think she’s gonna suspend half of the student body?”  Okay, well that was a gross over exaggeration, but when Michael didn’t bother to learn anyone’s names, it was hard to keep track of how many people it was.

Christine sighed.  “People are mean.”

“Yep.  Good luck with your audition.”

Christine beamed.  “Thanks!”

Michael had never had someone to sit with at lunch before, but he had to say it made the whole experience generally less awful.  He got no pitying looks from people who had friends or grins from idiots about to humiliate him in some way. Instead he and Christine simply spent the whole period talking, and it was actually pretty great.

“Okay, but why are so many people so mean to you?” Christine asked.  “In my experience all the bullies in the school don’t gang up on one person.”

“I think Rich Goranski has threatened to make their lives miserable if they don’t do so for me.” Michael said with a shrug.  “I wouldn’t be surprised if they have to pay up with stories of embarrassing me behind the school. Standing in a dark corner, black trench coats, hats, sunglasses.”

Christine laughed.  “How are you so calm about this?”

“Chrissy, in two years I’ll be out of this hellhole and I won’t have to worry about any of these assholes ever again.  And I’ve always known the ‘best four years of your life’ thing was crap, so what to do I have to stress over?”

Christine hummed in understanding.  “That’s a good point.”

It was like a switch had been flipped for Michael’s school day.  Christine seemed to be a lot more interested in spending time with him all of a sudden, which was probably originally because of her curiosity about Jeremy, but she didn’t mention him once during free period aside from saying to not forget to tell him about the sleepover and that she’d see him tomorrow.  And (unsurprisingly) having a friend to talk to throughout the day and look forward to seeing made the entire thing a million times better.

That didn’t mean he wasn’t ready for the school day to be over.  Michael could only be a certain amount of optimistic before he filled his quota and had to go back to dreading everything.

He drove home and dropped his stuff off before heading back out.  His mothers actually thought he was in a club, and he felt kind of bad lying to them, but if he told them about Jeremy, he had no idea how they would react.

“Hey, Jer!” Michael called as he walked into the house.  “I’m here!”

Jeremy flew up through the floor.  “Okay, I want to watch something new today.” he said definitively.

“Oh, I’m great.  Thanks for asking.”

“Shut up, I’m so bored!  What haven’t I seen before?”

“I would’ve thought you’d be less bored with Christine showing up later now.” Michael said.  “Speaking of such, she thought it’d be a good idea to spend the night here tomorrow night, since apparently that’s the most boring time of the— day.”

Jeremy’s face lit up.  “Really? Oh my gosh, yes!  Tell her I said thank you! She’s awesome!”  He paused a second later and hovered slightly lower in a way that Michael had learned meant disappointment.

“What is it?” Michael asked in confusion.

“I just— I don’t know.  It’s nothing.”

“It’s clearly not.”

“It’s just— I think Christine is really pretty.” Jeremy said softly, and Michael’s heart skipped a beat.  “But it’s not like I could ever date her or anything. That’s kind of really disappointing.”

Oh.

Jeremy had a crush on Christine.

Okay.  That makes sense, because Jeremy is a straight boy from the 1990s and Christine was amazing, and if Michael liked girls he would probably like her too.

Michael apparently failed to cover up the rushing thoughts going through his head, because Jeremy noticed something on his face.

“Wait, I’m sorry.  Did— do you like Christine?  I wasn’t trying to—”

“I’m gay.” Michael blurted, and fuck.  He looked quickly up at Jeremy to see his eyes widening, and  _ fuck. _

“Wait, you are?” Jeremy actually looked scared, and Michael wished he could crawl in a hole.  “That— that is okay here, right? Like that stuff is more accepted?”

That was not the question Michael was expecting.  “Uh— yes?” he said hesitantly.

And then Jeremy breathed a sigh of relief.  Michael blinked.

“Okay.” Jeremy said.  “Okay, good. Because where I come from that isn’t looked at as like— normal, and I don’t want you to get in trouble.”

Michael blinked again.  “Huh?”

“Like, it wasn’t illegal or anything.” Jeremy said.  “But there was only one openly gay kid in school and literally everyone made fun of him.  Even Sean. And you get bullied enough as it is.”

Michael wasn’t quite sure what to say.  “Huh?”

Now Jeremy looked confused.  “What?” And then he seemed to get it.  “Wait, did you not tell me because you thought I’d react badly?”

Michael’s awkward silence answered, and Jeremy looked almost offended.  “Come on, I’d like to think I’m a better person than that!”

“Uh— I don’t know.” Michael finally said.  “You just said that people from your time aren’t as accepting.”

“Yeah, because they’re a bunch of assholes.” Jeremy grumbled, crossing his arms.  “I mean, I guess my dad always has been one to be more accepting of that stuff than other people I know, but that just means that they all need a reality check.”

“So… you’re okay with this.”

“Of course I am.”

“Okay.” Michael said, and even he could hear the relief in his voice.

“Sleepover?” Jeremy said, raising an eyebrow.

Michael grinned.  “Yeah, sleepover.”

…

The following night rushed up quickly, and before Michael knew it he was pulling into the overhang by the house that hid his car, grabbing his bag, and walking around to the back where Christine was already sitting with Jeremy on the back porch.

“Hey, Michael!” Jeremy called, waving.  “Can you tell Christine that it’s rude to eat in front of a ghost?”  Christine was eating a banana while sitting next to Jeremy on the porch.

In response to Jeremy’s request, Michael pulled an apple out of his bag and took a massive bite out of it.  Jeremy scoffed in mock offense. “Oh my God, I hate you both!” he exclaimed, and both Christine and Michael laughed.

“Jeremy wants to watch BBC Sherlock.” Christine said, leaning back on her hands.

“Ooh, yeah, that’s a bad idea.” Michael said.  “You’re gonna get too emotionally invested, especially for the amount of content we can show you.”

“Okay, but isn’t it a good show?  I want to watch something new.”

Michael sighed.  “Okay, but don’t say we didn’t warn you.”

It went about as you’d expect, with lots of tears.

“We warned you.” Michael muttered, as Jeremy hovered inches away from the phone with tears streaming down his face.

“That’s so not fair.” Jeremy whispered.  “He was just trying to save his friends.”

“Life’s not fair, Jeremy.” Michael said.  “Alright, we’ll watch more another time.”

Jeremy gawked at him.  “No no no, how can you leave it at that?  You can’t do this to me!”

“Everyone else in the world had to wait two years, Jer.” Christine said.  “I wanna look at the stars.”

“But— but—” Jeremy exclaimed, pushing against the barrier that kept him on the porch.  “Guys, come on!”

“Tomorrow, Jer.” Michael said, laying down on one of the sleeping bags that they’d put as close to the porch as possible— they might have taken a risk going in the house already, but Michael wasn’t quite sure he wanted to lay down in there.

“He’s actually really sweet.” Christine said quietly.  If he didn’t know better, Michael would say she sounded a little sad.

“He’s over there, you can just tell him that.” Michael said in confusion.

“No, I— I’m saying this because I don’t want to scare him, Michael.”

“Scare him?  What are you talking about?”

“He’s really sweet, and I don’t want to hurt him.  But you said you’re looking for his father and his friend and you can’t find them?”

“Uh… yeah?” Michael said, glancing over so he could see Christine but Jeremy wouldn’t know they were talking without him.

“Michael,” Christine said hesitantly.  “Have you considered that could be because they’re also dead?”

Michael froze.  “W-what?”

“You said you’ve been looking for almost a year.  It can’t be that hard to find someone, right?”

“He’s a teenager who died in the nineties that no one knew.  Why shouldn’t it be hard?” Michael asked. That probably came out a little harsher than he meant it to, but the alternative felt worse.

“Michael I— I looked up deaths relating to Paul Heere, and I found something,” Christine said sadly.

Michael went absolutely still.  “But— but that’s—”

“Look up Paul Heere when you go home tomorrow.  He died in a car crash— well, sort of. We probably shouldn’t tell him tonight, but we need to tell him soon.”

She was right, wasn’t she?

“God this is—” Michael put his hands over his face.

“Yeah.” Christine said quietly.

“What are you guys talking about?” Jeremy called.

_ “Fine!” _ Michael groaned.  “We’ll show you one more episode of Sherlock!”

“Yes!” Jeremy yelled happily, doing a flip in midair.

Christine shot Michael a look, which Michael promptly ignored and walked over to the porch.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jeremy’s dad did not simply die in a car crash, and now Michael and Christine have to tell Jeremy what actually happened.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it’s been so long, this chapter was a tough one to write.

Paul Heere had died in a car crash after the breaks had been cut.  The police said that foul play was the obvious conclusion but never could prove anything.

Basically, Jeremy’s dad had been _murdered._

“We can’t tell him that!  Christine, what are you thinking?” Michael exclaimed.

“Michael, he deserves to know.  We can’t keep something like this from him!” Christine replied.

Michael shoved his tray away before banging his head on the table.  “Christine, you’ve known Jeremy for less than a week and I _know_ you can already tell that he takes everything really hard.  This would crush him.”

“Michael, I know _you_ know he wants to know what happened to his father.”

“‘I know you know he wants to know?’”

“Don’t change the subject.  You can’t keep something he wants to know this badly from him.”

Michael sighed, lifting his head up.  “I can’t?”

“No, Michael, you can’t.” Christine said.  “You know that’s not right, and you know Jeremy would want to know.”

“Oh, he would?  I’ve known Jeremy longer than you, how would you know what he wants to know?”

“Michael, that’s not fair.”

Michael sighed.  “I know.”

They were both silent for a couple seconds.

“Are we done with our ‘know’ conversation?” Christine asked.

“Yeah.” Michael mumbled.  “Yeah, we have to tell him.”

Which was how they ended up at the house after Christine told Mr. Reyes she wouldn’t be at Play Rehearsal.

“Hey, Jeremy?” Michael called, much gentler than he usually did, which Jeremy of course picked up on as he flew up from the basement.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.  “Wait, Christine? Don’t you usually come later?”

“Jeremy, we have to tell you something.” Christine said.

Jeremy realized immediately that something was happening.  “What is it?” he asked. “What’s wrong?”

Both Christine and Michael looked at each other as they seemed to simultaneously realize they should have practiced this conversation at least once.

“Um—” Michael said.  “So you know how I’ve been trying to find your dad and Sean?”

Jeremy’s face lit up.  “Yeah?”

“No, don’t— don’t get your hopes up, Jer.” Michael said carefully, and Jeremy stopped smiling.

“What?” he asked.

“Jeremy, your father is dead.” Christine said quietly.

Jeremy went absolutely still in midair.

“He— someone killed him.” Michael said, because it was better if they just got it all out at once.  “Someone cut the breaks in his car, and the police never found out who.”

Jeremy’s face was unreadable, and then he suddenly dove up and then flew quickly back down through the floor.

“Jeremy!” Michael called.  Both he and Christine moved downstairs as quickly as possible while they could still be safe.

But when they got there the basement was empty.

“Where’d he go?” Christine asked.

“He went under the house.” Michael knelt down onto the floor.  “Jeremy?” he said to the ground. “Are you okay?”

He didn’t hear a response.

“Do you want time alone?” Michael called.  “We can go.”

Jeremy’s head poked up through the floor, and he shook his head slightly before popping back underneath.

Michael and Christine both sat on the floor of the basement, and Michael started talking about something stupid Madeline had done last week (according to Jenna), and Christine kept up the other half of the conversation with both of them interrupting for intervals of encouraging statements.

After about an hour of this kind of thing, Jeremy flew slowly up through the floor with tear stains on his cheeks and red eyes.

“You want to talk about it?” Christine asked.

Jeremy shook his head, but was already talking.  “I mean, Dad was never really… he was never really a good father, but I didn’t want him to—”

“No, of course not.” Christine said.

Jeremy rubbed at his eyes.  “Dad never wore pants.” he said.

Christine tipped her head in confusion.  “Um… what?”

Jeremy had told Michael this before.  His dad had more or less fallen apart after his wife, Jeremy’s mother, left them with almost no warning.  And though Jeremy had sort of got what his dad was going through, it was generally understood by both him and Michael that Mr. Heere should have tried harder than he did.

But Jeremy had said it himself, that didn’t mean they wanted him to die.

Jeremy relayed all of this to Christine as she listened, while she fidgeted with her fingers in her lap and attempted to not show the pity that Michael was sure was there— because he was hiding his own.

It was another hour or so of Jeremy talking about things he had done with his father or things he remembered about him (with both Michael and Christine ignoring the tears that fell down his face every now and then), before Jeremy finally stopped and wiped at his face one more time.  “I want to hear Whitney Houston.” he said.

Michael put on the record in the corner, and they listened to “I Wanna Dance With Somebody” while Christine danced and Michael and Jeremy decided to just watch this time around.

“Did you find Sean at all?” Jeremy asked quietly at one point.  “Is he dead too?”

“I don’t know.” Michael admitted.  He’d been trying to find him as long as he’d been trying to find Jeremy’s dad, so Michael wouldn’t be surprised, but he wasn’t going to say that.  There’d already been enough emotional revelations for one day. Besides, he’d looked up deaths relating to Sean Hart and hadn’t found anything.

That was a question that was going to have to be solved another day.

…

The following morning seemed pretty standard at first.  Michael had barely made it inside the building when Rich appeared, pulling Michael to his side and putting an arm around his shoulders like they were old friends.  “Hey, Michael!” he called, in a tone like Michael should be glad to see him. “How’ve ya been?”

“Oh, just swell, Rich, just swell.  Can we skip the small talk today and go straight to the strangling?”

“Shut up, dumbass.  There’s something I need to know.”  And before Michael could even react, Rich pulled him to the side and into the bathroom.  It was empty, great. Therefore if Rich murdered him, no one would be there to help. Not that anyone would have helped anyway.  Rich was surprisingly strong and threatening for such a short guy.

Michael edged himself close to the door and managed to make it to about three feet away before Rich raised an eyebrow and Michael was forced to back up a couple feet.

He waited silently until Rich finally spoke up.  “Why do you go to that old house nearby after school everyday?”

Michael froze.  There was no way Rich could know.  Christine made sense, she lived across the street.  But as far as Michael knew, Rich didn’t live anywhere near there, and Michael always drove around the block at least once before going to see Jeremy.  He usually made some kind of stop to grab something first. Decorations, stuff from home, stuff Jeremy didn’t have to hold to enjoy. Point is, he never went straight to the house.  Rich couldn’t know about Jeremy. More importantly, Rich _couldn’t_ know about Jeremy because that would put Jeremy in danger.

“I mean, you go everyday, I’m surprised only one other person has noticed.” Rich said, drumming his fingers on his arms like he was waiting impatiently, like he hadn’t just said that three seconds ago, like he hadn’t just tipped Michael’s world on its head.  “Why do you go there huh? Are you meeting someone?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Michael got out.  He was pretty sure Rich didn’t believe him, both because he didn’t think he’d sounded at all convincing and because Rich rolled his eyes to prove he hadn’t sounded at all convincing.

How did Rich know?  Why did he _care?_  Whatever the answer, Michael was pretty sure he wasn’t finding a way out of this one.

Until a teacher walked into the bathroom.  “Better get moving, boys, the bell will ring soon,” he said, like either of them had cared about school in years.  But he stared at the both of them until Rich finally grumbled under his breath and stalked away, and Michael had never loved a teacher more in his life.  Michael followed and Rich glared at him just outside the bathroom before smirking. “See you after school.” He stalked away.

Fuck.

…

You would think, after something like that, the day would zip by as you approached something you were dreading.  This was not the case. Michael’s morning originally started by crawling by until he found himself wishing whatever was going to happen would just happen already.  But then he looked over at the clock and how the _hell_ had it only been fifteen minutes, that’s like, actually not possible—

Oh okay, now it’s been another fifteen.  Seriously, what?

That was pretty much how Michael’s day went.  1st period felt like it would never end, and suddenly he blinked and 2nd period was over.  And he was going to talk to Christine during 4th period, which meant 3rd period felt like it would never end.  Mr. Reyes was going on about some unrelated subject to what he was supposed to be teaching— it was probably hot pockets to be honest.  The man’s love for them knew no bounds. Michael spent the class staring at the clock and counting to sixty forty-five times.

When he finally got to 4th period he immediately sat down next to Christine.  “Rich knows about Jeremy,” he hissed.

Christine whirled to face him.  “What?!” she exclaimed.

“Shh-hhh!” Michael waved his hands to try and quiet her down.

“How’d he find out?” she asked, much quieter.  She had grabbed her ring and started twisting it back and forth, which Michael was pretty sure was both a nervous tick and something she did to get rid of extra energy.

“I have no idea.” Michael replied.

“Well, what are we supposed to do?”

“I’m ditching for lunch to go warn Jeremy.” Michael said.

“I’m coming with you.” Christine said firmly.

Michael blinked in surprise.  “Really?”

“Yes!” Christine exclaimed, and Michael waved his hands in another ‘shush’ movement.  “I’m not leaving you to deal with this on your own, I’d be a lousy friend, wouldn’t I?”

Therefore, after 4th period zipped by— seriously, what was up with that?— they both made it out a side door while everyone was going to lunch and walked around the school to reach Michael’s PT Cruiser.

Unlike most of Michael’s visits, this time they went straight to the house, and found Jeremy staring at the pages of a book they had ripped out and laid on the floor for him to read.  He jumped in surprise when they ran in through t9he backdoor, and then his look changed to confusion. “It can’t be 3:30 already.” he said.

“Rich found out about you somehow!” Christine said as Michael went for the pages taped onto the floor and started to pull them up.

“Rich Goranski?!” Jeremy exclaimed, and started to fidget with his hands in the way that meant he was nervous.  “How?!”

“We have no clue,” Michael said, taking all the papers and shoving them in his backpack.  “But now he’s coming here after school so we have to hide all evidence of someone being here.”

Christine grabbed all of the stuff they used for board games and shoved them into her backpack, Michael grabbed the candle sitting on the window sill, and then they both moved downstairs, grabbing everything (except for the record player, which had already been there and was too heavy to move, but Michael grabbed the Whitney Houston record) before running back upstairs to double check they’d gotten everything.

“Jer?” Michael said.  “We’re gonna need you to hide out under the house.  We’ll call you when it’s safe.”

“Got it.” Jeremy said, and disappeared.

“How are we going to frame this, Michael?” Christine asked.

“We have to make it look like a big deal.” Michael said.  “He already knows I freaked out when he said he was coming here, if we make it look like we don’t even care, he’ll get more suspicious.  He’s a jerk, not stupid. Maybe… I’m secretly a theatre nerd?” he suggested.

“You’re friends with me.  That wouldn’t surprise anyone.” Christine replied.  “Maybe we’re dating?”

“I’m gay.  Maybe… maybe it’s got something to do with you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Something you don’t want people to know, that we’re both trying to keep people from finding out.  That would be more believable than me caring what people think of me.”

“That’s a good point.” Christine said.  “What if—” she cut herself off and her eyes widened.  “What if I have a crush on _Rich?!”_

“Oh, wow, that is so gross, but that could _work!”_ Michael said, snapping his fingers.  “Do you have any pictures of Rich?”

“Uh, like, yearbook pictures?”

“That’ll do.  Let’s go get ‘em.  Are your parents at home?”

“No, it’s the middle of the day, they’re at work.” Christine pulled a house key out of her backpack.

They went into her house and up into her room, which was covered in Christine’s favorite plays and musicals.

“Why am I not surprised?” Michael said with a fond smile and a roll of his eyes.

“Hush, we have a job to do.”

They found the two pictures of Rich from sophomore and junior year, and to both of their surprise, also one from freshman year.

“I didn’t know he went here freshman year…” Christine muttered, and wrinkled her nose at the picture.  “That doesn’t look anything like Rich.”

“How many people have a last name ‘Goranski?’” Michael questioned.  “It’s got to be him.  But we should probably leave that one out. If no one knows he went here freshman year, there’s probably a reason.”

“I wonder how long he’s gone to this school district.” Christine mused.  “I suggest a full-scale investigation later.”

“I’ll help you.  But for now, two pictures isn’t enough to make a shrine.  Can you draw?”

Christine winced.  “Uh… kind of?”

“Ooh boy, I can’t either.  Here we go.”

Two terrible people drawings and a fancy name drawing that was much better later, they went back over to the house and started to hang up the drawings and the pictures.

“Ugh, this still feels really small…” Christine grumbled.  “It would be more like creepy-crush territory if we had like, one of his shirts or something.”

“I don’t think there’s much we can do about that.  Oh, you know what?” Michael grabbed his backpack. “I think I still have this failed test that he taped to my backpack that he wrote ‘Kick Me’ on.  I never bothered to throw it away, here.” Michael pulled it out and handed it to Christine, who taped it up next to Rich’s sophomore yearbook picture.

“Let’s add some hearts to the drawings and call it a day.” Michael said, handing Christine a pen.

“Remind me to burn all this later.”

“I will help you.”

The remaining hour or so before school ended was spent waiting around, and then, at 3:00, they both took post by a window to keep watch for Rich.

He showed up at around 3:15.  When he was about 50 feet from the house Michael hissed, “Okay, start tearing stuff down!”

So they both dove for the pictures and tried to look as desperate as possible while ripping down the pictures.

Rich showed up in the back doorway when they’d gotten down one of the drawings.  “What the fuck—”

And Christine, beautiful actress that she was, squealed in very convincing despair and dove behind Michael’s back.

Rich stared at the both of them, and Michael gave what he hoped was a convincing scowl.  “Congratulations, Rich. You figured it out. Now can you leave Chrissy alone, please?”

Rich blinked, like he was still trying to process what he was seeing in front of him.  “You— what.”

“Yeah.  Here’s the big secret, Rich.  I come here every day because she wants someone to rant to, and I’m just that great a friend.  Now can you leave us in peace please.”

And lo and behold, Rich blinked once more in struggling concentration, and turned and walked off.

They both ran to the window and watched him until he was out of sight, and then breathed a sigh of relief.

“Laying it on a little thick with the ‘great friend’ thing, don’t you think?” Christine asked.

“I am a great friend.  Nice acting, by the way.”

“It’s a gift.”

“I know.”

They waited another five minutes before calling Jeremy back upstairs, who laughed his head off when he saw the evidence of Christine’s “crush.”

They spent the next while setting everything back up so the house looked like it had before, and then Christine left for play rehearsal and Michael explained what had happened throughout that day to Jeremy.

“But how did he know?” Jeremy asked, and Michael shrugged.

“We really have no idea.  Chrissy and I are gonna have to do some ‘investigating.’”

“Alright, well, keep me updated, will you?”

“Of course.”

And that was that, and they moved on to lighter topics.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More investigating clearly needs to be done on the subject of Richard Goranski, but for now there’s also other things to worry about.

Apparently, Rich going to their school freshman year was not that big of a deal, because he had also gone to their school district way back in Kindergarten.

“I don’t understand.” Christine said.  It was late on a Saturday morning, and they were both pouring over the yearbooks in the house, with Jeremy looking over their shoulders.  “Why would he show up as a new kid in sophmore year if he’s gone to this school his whole life?”

“I think you’re missing the obvious, Chrissy.” Michael said.

“What?”

“He was lonely.  If no one knew you and you had gone to that school district your whole life…”

“Yeah.” Jeremy confirmed.  “I would want to reinvent myself too.”

“But people can’t just do that.” Christine protested.  “You can’t just suddenly become a new person. Something had to have happened, or he had to have had help, or something.”

Jeremy inhaled sharply, and they both glanced over to see him shaking his head like he was trying to clear fog out of it.

“Jer?” Michael asked.

“No, nothing, I just— I thought I remembered something, for a second.  Are you, um— are you sure Rich is doing okay?”

They both stared at him for a moment.  “This is the guy who makes my life miserable, now thinks Christine has a massive crush on him, and almost found out about you and exposed you to the world.” Michael said in disbelief.  “And you want to know if he’s doing okay?”

Jeremy bit his lip and his brow furrowed.  “No, I just— nevermind. You’re right, that’s stupid.”  He still looked really bothered by something.

“Jeremy, what’s wrong?” Christine asked.

“I… I don’t know.” Jeremy admitted.

Michael and Christine shared a concerned look.  “You… thought you remembered something about your death?” Michael asked carefully.

“No, nevermind.  It’s nothing.” Jeremy said, waving his hand dismissively.  He turned back to Christine. “You were saying something else?”

“Uh… I don’t remember what it was.”

“Well, regardless of whether or not he had help somehow, Rich has still gone here for a long time, and the question is how _did_ he become a brand new person in sophomore year?” Michael said.

“Yeah, and how are we supposed to answer that question?” Christine asked.

“I don’t know!” Michael said, throwing up his hands.  “Why don’t we ask him?”

“Well, because then he’d probably—”

“I’m aware of the result, Christine, I was being sarcastic.”

All three of them heaved a sigh.

Their various thoughts were interrupted by Michael’s phone going off.  All of them jumped a bit and Michael grabbed his phone and answered.

“Hi _nanay,_ ” he said.

“Michael, are you at Christine’s house?” Analyn asked.

“Uh, yeah, why?  What’s up?”

“Can you come home for lunch?  Bring Christine with you.”

“Oh, okay.  Uh, why?”

“You’ve been spending a lot of time with her, _pulot._  We want to meet your best friend.”

_My other best friend is a ghost.  You’ll never meet him._

“Yeah, alright, we’ll be there in 15 minutes.” Michael said, rising and grabbing the yearbooks he’d brought.

“See you then.”

Michael hung up and slipped his phone in his pocket.  “Christine, my moms want you to come by for lunch.”

“Oh, okay.” Christine said brightly, gathering up the other yearbooks that she’d brought over.

Jeremy heaved a sigh.

“Sorry, Jer.” Michael said.  “I’d introduce you if I could.”

“It’s okay, I’ll see you guys tomorrow.” Jeremy said, waving them off.

They got in Michael’s car outside, pulled it out from under the overhang, and started off towards Michael's house.

“So, next Saturday is Halloween.” Christine said brightly.

“Yeah, what about it?”

“Michael!  Our best friend is a ghost, what do we do for the scariest holiday of the year?”

“Um… stay in the house and play cards?  Sorry, Chrissy, Jeremy can’t go anywhere.  Plus, he can’t enjoy any candy, so eating some in front of him would just be plain mean.”

“I ate a banana in front of him.”

“That was teasing.  Candy is a whole other story.”

A determined look came over Christine‘s face.  “Yeah, no. Not this year. We are doing something amazing, and it is going to be— amazing!”

Michael raised an eyebrow.  “What are doing?”

“I don’t know yet!  But it’s gonna be—” she gestured at him.

“Amazing.” Michael finished with a slight eye roll.

“Yeah it is!” Christine yelled, throwing her hands up.

Around five minutes later they pulled into Michael’s house.

Christine hopped out, excited due to the fact that she’d never been there before, which was almost all she’d talked about on the ride there, the other thing being Halloween.

Both of Michael’s moms were in the kitchen, despite Analyn not being able to cook for shit, and Rachel being the one who made all the meals.  Analyn was still the one who stepped out when the front door opened, and brightened when she saw Christine. “Hello!” she said cheerfully, holding out a hand which Christine happily shook.  “You must be Christine.”

“Yep!” Christine called just as cheerfully.  “Which mom are you?” A second later she clapped her hands over her mouth.  “Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry! That was so rude!”

Analyn chuckled.  “That’s okay. I’m Analyn.  Rachel is the one making the meal right now, because if I tried it probably wouldn’t be edible.”

Christine laughed again, and Michael muttered the affirmation that earned him The Look from Analyn.

About five minutes after the three of them sat down Rachel came in with ham sandwiches.

“Um, no offense,” Christine said as she took one, “but it’s kind of hard to screw up sandwiches.”

“A, you’ve never seen me cook, and B, Rachel adds a secret ingredient.”

“To ham sandwiches?” Christine asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Try it.” Michael said, gesturing at the sandwich.  Christine did, and her eyes widened.

“Oh, wow, that is _so_ good!”

“Told you.” Michael said, grabbing his own sandwich.

“Any point in asking what the secret ingredient is?” Christine asked.

“Nope.” all three Mells said simultaneously.

Michael ate his own sandwich as Christine asked his moms about various things— Michael barely managed to fend off embarrassing stories about him— and his moms answered with plenty of questions about the things Christine liked, which naturally led to her going on excited rants about theatre.

And then, near the end of lunch, Christine asked a very telling question— ideas for a haunted house.

“Well, it has to look scary, naturally,” Rachel said.  “So plenty of Halloween decorations, jump scares, and… what age group is this for?”

“Probably little kids.” Christine said.

“So no real-life horror, then.  Maybe a few ghosts?”

Christine and Michael exchanged a glance.

“We’ve got that covered.” Christine said.

Analyn gave them both a look.  “What do you mean?”

“Uh—” Michael floundered.

“Sheets.” Christine jumped in smoothly.  “My family has _so_ many extra sheets it’s ridiculous.  And since this is for little kids, we don’t have to go all elaborate.”

“Wait, you two are planning on making this haunted house?  Where?” Rachel asked.

“There’s this old house across the street for my place.  Really old, but structurally sound, don’t worry.” Christine said.  “And Michael and I thought it would be fun to make a haunted house for Halloween.”

“I think that sounds wonderful.” Analyn said.  “I’m sure all the kids would love it.”

“That’s why we’re doing it!” Christine said with a grin.

Michael suspected that was only half true.

…

Jeremy, when he found out about the idea, was ecstatic.  The next week was spent borrowing some of Michael And Christine’s semi-scary Halloween decorations, and Jeremy practicing on how to be scary— it was hilarious, but Jeremy the Ghost was probably the least scary out of the three of them.

They found out that while Jeremy had never been part of haunted house before, he and Sean had gone to a different one every year, and— while Sean had a lot of the time blatantly ignored when Jeremy was scared, Jeremy had still had fun.

It was during this that Christine asked a pretty revealing question.

“Jeremy,” she asked curiously.  “Did you have a crush on Sean?”

Jeremy blinked, like he’d never considered the idea before.  “What?”

“Well, you blush whenever you talk about him, and you seem to be pretty willing to forgive some… less than awesome behavior he’s displayed.”

Jeremy half-glared at her.  “Hey, Sean wasn’t a bad friend.”

“I’m not saying that.  I’m saying he seems a bit more concerned about his own feelings than yours, and if you had a crush on him that’s something you would pretty easily forgive.”

Jeremy looked like he was deep in thought.  “I mean— I’ve thought about kissing guys before, but doesn’t everyone do that?  Like, don’t straight guys do that too?”

Christine and Michael exchanged a look.  “I mean, I guess we can’t talk,” Michael said, trying to shove down the newly blossoming feeling of hope, because _God_ , hormones, _shut up._  “But I don’t think so.”

“Huh.” Jeremy said, floating slowly down to the ground.  “So, what, does that make me bi?”

“If that’s what you feel comfortable identifying as.” Christine said.

“What else is there?”

Christine started listing off on her fingers.  “Straight, gay, bi, pan, ace (that’s what I am), aro, demi—”

“Woah, slow down!” Jeremy held his hands up.  “That’s too much.”

“Yeah, the whole community has expanded a lot since you died.” Michael said.  “And that’s not even getting into the difference of sexual attraction vs romantic attraction.”

“I think I’ll stick with bi.” Jeremy said.  “That’s one that _I_ understand.”

So, Jeremy was bi.  Michael was not going to read that, no siree.  That, or the looks Christine kept shooting him the rest of the day.

Besides, they had a haunted house to plan.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Christine says she found Sean Hart, but what she is describing makes Michael very confused and sounds borderline impossible.

Michael was woken up far too early that  Saturday by his cell phone ringing.

He slapped his hand on his on his nightside table a couple times before he grabbed his phone and accepted the call.  “Hel—” he yawned. “Hello?”

_“MICHAEL!”_

“AHH!” Michael fell of his bed.  Christine was screaming over the phone.  “Chrissy, what— _whyyyy?”_

_“MichaelIfoundSeanHartandIdon’tunderstandhowyouhaven’tbecause—”_

“Chrissy. Slow. Down.  It is to early on a Saturday for you to be talking that fast.”

_“Michael. I. Found. Sean. Hart.”_

Michael woke up.  “You what?! Where is he?  Oh, God, he’s not dead, is he?”

_“No, he’s the owner and  founder of Hart Industries!”_

“He’s… huh?”

_“He’s the owner and founder of Hart Industries, a_ massive _technology company in Japan!”_

“He’s… no, he can’t be.  I would’ve found something on him.”

_“Come over here.”_ Christine said, and she hung up.

Michael blinked a couple times before grabbing his glasses.  A second later he grabbed his hoodie and threw it on over his tank top and ran up the stairs, grabbing his tennis shoes too.

“Mom?  Nanay? I have to go to Chrissy’s.”

“What?  Why?” Rachel asked.

“I don’t know, really.” Michael said, deciding on the truth.  “She apparently wants to show me something really important.”

“Be back by lunch.” Analyn said.

“Shouldn’t be a problem, it’s like, 8AM.” Michael groaned, grabbing the car keys and walking out to the driveway (his moms claimed ownership of the garage, and Michael wasn’t going to fight a decision that made sense).

When he arrived at Christine’s and knocked, the door was answered by a woman just as short as Christine who was wearing pajamas, like every normal person in the universe at 8AM on a Saturday except for Michael.

“Oh, hello.” she said.  “You’re Michael, right? Christine said you were coming.”  She stuck out her hand. “Hi, I’m Christine’s mother, you can call me Rebecca.”

“Nice to meet you, Rebecca.” Michael said, shaking her hand.

“Well, come on in.” Rebecca said.  “Christine’s in her room, you can go right up.  It’s the first door on the right.”

“Thank you.” Michael said.

He found Christine typing furiously on a computer, and he stood in the doorway for about ten seconds before he called “Chrissy?”

Christine glanced up in surprise.  “Oh, Michael! Come look at this!”

Michael started to walk over to where Christine was sitting on the bed.  “Yeah, see, I don’t understand how this guy could possibly be who you say he is, because— oh.”

There was a very official looking website talking about Sean Hart and Hart Industries in Japan, just like Christine said.  So unless they were talking about a different Sean Hart— okay, that wasn’t that unreasonable, but still didn’t explain why Michael didn’t find _anything_ on the guy.

“H-how—?” Michael stammered.  “I swear, I never found anything—”

“I believe you.  But I looked on my computer, and my phone, and we can look on my mom’s computer if you’re not convinced—”

“No, I’m convinced, just… _so_ confused.”

“Okay, I’ve been thinking, and I know it sounds insane, but what if you couldn’t find anything because… he hacked your computer?”

Michael stared at her.  “Christine, I am a _high schooler from New Jersey_ and he is _the owner and founder of an extremely successful company.”_

“What other explanation is there?”

“Some kind of error?  My computer’s kinda old.”

“An error that accidentally blocked dozens of websites?”

“Can you hack a computer and block dozens of websites?”

“Probably?”

“Christine, that very suggestion is still ridiculous!” Michael snapped.

“Don’t get mad at me!  I know about as much as you do right now!”

“Fine, sorry, just— who is this guy?”

They spent the next few hours looking at information on Sean Hart, the founder of an extremely successful company that turned up no results on Michael’s computer.  Turns out he’d made a bunch of technological advances that had shown up in America only in bits at a time, which was why they didn’t know him off the top of their head.  He had grown up in Red Bank, New Jersey, so it was likely he was Jeremy’s old friend, though there were no mentions of Jeremy himself. He had several degrees in psychology and engineering, as well as being a generally smart person (obviously).

Michael was having a little bit of trouble connecting this person with what Jeremy had described as a geek who was obsessed with robots, took him to haunted houses, and was a little bit selfish; but that caused them both to realize that, duh, Jeremy would know.

Which was how, at 11AM, they were sitting in the house across the street and Jeremy was staring in shock at this computer that was telling him about his once-best-friend.

“That’s him alright.” he said.  He laughed a little. “Geez, Sean, you did really well for yourself.”

“Do you have any idea why he didn’t show up on my computer?” Michael asked.  He was looking at the website with Jeremy as Christine was scrolling down the page when Jeremy asked her to.

Jeremy shrugged.  “Well, he could’ve hacked your computer.”

Michael threw up his hands.  “Why would he do that? There is no reasonable way that he could know or care about me!”

“That was something he always did.  He messed with younger kids sometimes.  He said he liked—” Jeremy made finger quotes— “‘playing with the people at the bottom.’”

Michael and Christine both raised their eyebrows.  “That’s… kind of concerning, Jeremy.” Christine said eventually.

“Why?” Jeremy asked, sounding genuinely confused.  “He never hurt them or anything. It was more minor inconveniences.”

Michael looked over at Christine to see her mirroring the same unsure feeling that he felt.  Michael eventually filed the information away under ‘stuff to think about later’ and returned to what they had been talking about.

“I… still don’t know if I think that’s reasonable.  I mean, out of 7 billion people, he decided to mess with the computer of the one person who really needed to find him?”

“It could be a coincidence.” Christine said.

Michael gave her a look.  “Seven. Billion. People.”

“Ehhh?” Christine said, giving an unconvincing shrug.

“Wait, go back up!” Jeremy called, suddenly, and Christine scrolled back up the page.  “It says he’s coming here!”

“What?” Christine asked, as all three of them now leaned over the screen.

Sure enough, Sean Hart was coming to Red Bank, New Jersey in—

“Three days?!” Christine exclaimed.  “Wow, that’s great!”

“Is it?” Michael asked.

Both Jeremy and Christine looked at him.  “Yes!” Christine called. “We can go talk to him and invite him to see Jeremy!”

Michael scoffed.  “Oh, yeah, just waltz right up and say ‘Hello, Mr. Extremely Successful Very Busy Business Person, guess what?  We know your old best friend from your teenage years. Did you know he’s a ghost now? You wanna come say howdy?’”

“Michael,” Jeremy said, and he actually sounded a little hurt.  “Can’t you try?”

Michael sighed, trying to remind himself that this was the only person still alive that Jeremy knew from his life, since his father was gone.  “I— I don’t know, Jer—” Jeremy sighed sadly— “I guess so.” Michael finished, and Jeremy lit up.

“Thank you!” Jeremy called, and leapt forward in what would have been a hug if he was able to actually touch Michael.  Whatever it was, it left them both shivering.

Somehow they ended up deciding that Michael would be the one to go talk to Sean Hart, the reasons being a combination of ‘Christine would possibly get very excited and hard to understand,’ ‘Michael had known Jeremy the longest,’ and ‘Jeremy wanted help setting up the house to make a good first impression.’

“Aww, what about the Haunted House?” Christine said.

“Next year, Christine!” Jeremy called, already flying around to see what would need to be done.

Christine sighed, a little disappointed, but she seemed to get over it pretty quickly.

Not long after that she and Michael went back to Christine’s house, and after an offer from Christine’s parents, Michael told his moms he would be staying for lunch to meet them.

He swore sometimes it actually felt like they were dating.  Since when was meeting your child’s friend this formal?

Rebecca was a musician, and Christine quoted her as where she’d gotten her own love of music that lead to her love of muisc- _als_ _._  And Christine’s father, Peter, who was a lot taller than both his wife and his daughter, was a nurse who worked at the hospital.  They both asked Michael plenty of questions about his hobbies and interests that for the most part, Michael didn’t mind answering.  Luckily, they didn’t ask about anything involving college or his future plans, because Michael was trying to avoid thinking about those subjects altogether.

After lunch, Christine walked out to his car with him and leaned in after Michael.  “Are you really that worried about Sean Hart?” she asked.

“Aren’t you?”

Christine bit her lip.  “Why are you worried?”

“I don’t know.  It just seems a little suspicious.  I find nothing on him, and you suddenly discover he’s a majorly successful guy coming here in three days?  It all seems a little too convenient.  Besides, it seems like he might not be as much of a bang-up guy as Jeremy thinks he is, what with the selfishness and the possible bullying.”

“That may be true, but are you really going to keep Jeremy from a chance to talk to him?”

Michael glared at her while Christine gave a grin that had no right to be that smug.  “I hate you.” he said.

“Love you too.”

Michael pulled away with a ball of unsettlement still sitting in his chest.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Michael can name two reasons Monday morning sucks: unanswered questions and lack of sleep.

Monday morning hit Michael gently, like a truck full of 70,000 pounds of bacon might hit a train.

“Geez, you look dead this morning,” Christine said in fourth period, thus saying the first sentence Michael had processed all day.

“I didn’t sleep that great last night.” Michael muttered, rubbing his eyes again.

“Are you still thinking about Sean?” Christine asked, tipping her head in concern.

“Yeah.” Michael muttered, rubbing at his eyes again.  “But I also watched about three hours of documentaries.”

“Michael!” Christine called, smacking his arm.  “That’s not a healthy sleep schedule!”

“Sorry, did I sign up for the Mom Friend Lecture?”

Christine gave him an almost-serious glare.

The day passed torturously slowly.  Michael had asked some of his internet friends (using the term rather loosely) about Sean Hart last night to see if anyone had heard anything, since he couldn’t do research on his computer and he didn’t want to suffer through research on his tiny phone screen.  One of the people he played Warcraft with had been about to reply when Rachel had stormed into Michael’s room and more or less shoved him out the door before he could see.

So while the teacher drawled on at the front of the room in what he could have _sworn_ was the Charlie Brown teacher voice, Michael was sitting in his seat trying not to fall asleep.  Christine poking him in the side every now and then was the only reason he hadn’t, unlike his past three classes.

Christine woke him up again by telling him it was time for lunch, which Michael slept through despite all the noise.

“Seriously, Michael, do I need to be concerned about your health?” Christine asked when she shook him awake at the end of lunch.

“No, I’m fine, just four more classes and then I’ll go home and take a nap.”

“You’re not going to see Jeremy today?”

“I’ll go to Jeremy’s and take a nap.”

Christine sighed.  “I’m calling you at midnight, and if you’re not asleep, I’ll be very upset.”

“Wouldn’t you have to be up at midnight to call me?”

Christine shot him a death glare, which meant Michael had used logic to easily poke holes in her plan.  “You better get some sleep tonight, Michael.”

“I will.” Michael reassured her.

Starting with half-sleeping through the next four classes.  Hey, it was nighttime somewhere, right?

…

“Geez, you look dead.” Jeremy said, looking up from where his book pages were taped to the floor.  “I thought that was my job.”

“Shut your face, Mr. ‘I Haven’t Slept In 20 Years.’”

“I fucking _wish_ I could still sleep.  That would fill up some time in my extremely boring nights.  Plus, sleeping was the _best._ ”

“D’ya mind if I nap while I set you up with ‘Wizards of Waverly Place?’” Michael asked, pulling his phone out and setting it against the wall.

“Sure, go ahead.  And then I’ll lay on top of you and make you cold the whole time.”

Michael flipped him off, and Jeremy gave a shit-eating grin.

Michael did actually end up falling asleep for several episodes, and Jeremy did not end up making him cold the whole time, but did wake him up that way when his phone died.

Michael plugged it in and helped Jeremy with his setting up the rest of the house.  They didn’t really do much aside from strip it of any and all decorations they had previously put up (which Michael felt was a little overboard, but he let it go), but Jeremy still seemed really grateful.

“Thanks for helping with all this Michael,” Jeremy said.  They had taken everything down and sat and talked for the next while, and now Michael was gathering his stuff to go home.  “I know you aren’t really on board with everything with Sean, so it means a lot that you’d help.”

“Yeah, well…” Michael gave a little waving hand gesture, as if that cleared it all up.  “This is really important to you. I’d be a lousy best friend otherwise, wouldn’t I? Besides, I like spending time with you even if we’re just taking down a bunch of posters and hiding a Whitney Houston record.”  Michael shut up and left before he said anything else that was stupid. If the idea hadn’t been totally ridiculous, he would have said Jeremy was blushing.

When Michael got home he set all his stuff down and turned on a documentary about the Black Plague.  He had watched about 20 minutes before remembering the conversation about Sean Hart, so he opened his Warcraft account on his computer to find the response from that morning.

It was confusing as all hell.

 

WickedTough: You mean Sean Hart, inventor of SQUIPs Sean Hart?

 

Michael’s brow furrowed, and he typed out an answer.

 

Gaymer: Was that a typo?  What the hell is a “squip”?

 

“WickedTough” responded almost immediately, in almost a desperate way.

 

WickedTough: DUDE

WickedTough: S.Q.U.I.P.  SQUIP. It stands for Super Quantum Unit Intel Processor.  It's a supercomputer compressed in a pill. You take it with Mountain Dew and it implants inside your BRAIN and is supposed to help you accomplish your goals.

Gaymer: …

Gaymer: Are you high?

WickedTough: NO

WickedTough: Dude, my brother took one of those, and he went from a straight D student to a freshman at HARVARD only to end up in a mental hospital later that year from trying to get it out!

WickedTough: SQUIPS are dangerous, and Sean Hart is dangerous!  Don’t you know anyone at school who just suddenly became popular?

 

Michael hesitated, thinking for a second of Rich Goranski, and how Christine said ‘you can’t just suddenly become a new person.’

Then he shook the thought out of his head and closed his computer.

Yeah.

Definitely high.

…

Tuesday was almost a snow day, which was just all the more fucking awful when Michael had to get up at an ungodly hour and tramp through the uncleared driveway in order to start his car and get to the “clear enough” road.

On days like these you could tell the students were united in collective misery and fury.  They all knew they’d been cheated. They should be home in bed with hot cocoa. It would have been early in the year for a snow day too, which would’ve made it doubly awesome.  The fact that Michael still had to drive through the cold later to talk to Sean Hart just made it twice as awful.

“I swear to God, Jeremy, if I end up seeing a therapist because people think ghosts aren’t real, I’ll kill you.” Michael muttered, rubbing his arms through his hoodie in the freezing first period class that was right by two walls connected to the outside.

Michael’s day continued to get worse, because Christine showed up in fourth period with the news that Sean Hart’s visit had been delayed until Saturday.

“You know I kinda hate that I have to find out everything about him from you?” Michael asked under his breath.

“Well, just know it’s not your fault that out of seven billion people he randomly picked your computer to hack.”

“Gee, thanks Chrissy.”

“No problem.”

Then the teacher told them to focus or she would move one of them to a different seat, so both of them shut up.

“Hey,” Michael said at lunch.  “You know according to this guy I talked to on Warcraft last night, Sean Hart invented a dangerous supercomputer that helps you accomplish your goals but also drives you insane.”

Christine gave him a bewildered look.  “What?”

“He was high, Chrissy.  And spouting nonsense.”

“Oh.” Christina laughed a little bit.  “You know, that kinda sounds like a good idea for a book.”

“A really weird book.” Michael said.

…

They had planned a sort of unplanned sleepover with Jeremy after hearing the news, and while he was disappointed that the possible visit was going to be put off until Saturday, was more than happy to try Christine’s newest idea for a pastime— board games.  (Okay, it wasn’t original, and Jeremy and Michael had played board games before, but she looked so excited when she brought over “Sorry” that neither of them had the heart to tell her.)

They played many different games way too late for a school night, and listened to songs from the 90s and talked about childhood stories and played Truth or Dare— sleepover stuff, with no interruptions of discovered deaths this time.

But this time they both slept underneath the overhang of the house, which was how Michael woke up shivering in the middle of the night in a sleeping bag with Jeremy running his hand through his shoulder.

“Sorry.” Jeremy mumbled.

“S’alright.” Michael said, sitting up and stretching.  “What’s up?”

“I’m nervous.”

“About what?”

“Saturday.” Jeremy said.  “I mean, I know it’s probably not likely that he’ll come, but if he does?  Even if he wasn’t ridiculously successful, he’s… 37 now. Michael, he’s gonna be so different.”

“Most people grow up, Jer.  The only reason you haven’t is because—”

“I’m dead, yeah.  And being stuck in that life stage just before puberty ends for all time is fucking awesome.”

Michael laughed.

Jeremy didn’t laugh, though, and Michael peered at him in concern.  “Jer?”

“Michael, what’s gonna happen when you grow up?” Jeremy whispered.

Michael sat up.  “W-what?”

“We’re the same age right now.” Jeremy said.  “But not too long from now you’re gonna go to college, and maybe move away, and make new friends and grow up, and I’ll be alone and—”

“Woah, woah, hey!” Michael called, because Jeremy was starting to cry.  “First of all, why are we thinking about that right now? That’s still like a year away.  And second, I don’t care how old I get, Jeremy, I will not abandon you.”

Jeremy sniffed and wiped at his eyes.  “Promise?” he whispered.

“Well duh, I promise.  You’re my best friend, Jer.”

Jeremy laughed, and it sounded a little bitter.  “Oh, I’m your best friend.” he said sarcastically.

“What are you talking about?  Of course of you are.”

“I’m tied to this house so we can never go anywhere or do anything, I have no idea what half the references are that you make, you can only see me from about 3PM to 6PM, and I’ve never even shaken your hand.  And all of that goes without mentioning that I’m a fucking ghost!”

“Well then all that means is that my best friend is a ghost.  Jeremy, half of the things you said are limitations you have no control over, so therefore they aren’t your fault.  And do you want me to list off the things we do? Because I will.” Michael started counting off on his fingers. “We listen to music, we watch crappy TV, we have sleepovers, we tell each other stuff we don’t tell anyone else, and we do nice things for each other.  That sounds like a pair of best friends to me.”

Jeremy sniffed and wiped at his eyes again, although he no longer looked that upset.  “You’re the best, you know that?”

“You’re just now realizing?”

Jeremy laughed, and it didn’t sound nearly as bitter.  “Get some sleep, dumbass.”

Michael stuck his tongue out and laid back down.  He fell asleep with a smile on his face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know the “Gaymer” username has been done before, but if it ain’t broke don’t fix it.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Michael goes to see Sean Hart.

“Okay, so are we mentioning right away that he’s a ghost?” Christine asked.

“I’d rather avoid a trip to the nearest mental hospital,” Michael cut in.  “I was planning on saying I had found something involving Jeremy’s death to show him and hoping that gets him to follow me here.”

“And if it doesn’t?” Jeremy asked.

“I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it.” Michael said.  “I can’t think of much else to do. He’s not going to follow a random 17 year old because he says ‘pretty please.’”

“You’ll text us if he comes though, right?” Jeremy asked, looking more and more nervous with each passing second.

“Course I will.  I’m gonna try my hardest to get him to come, Jer, I promise.”

Michael walked out the back door waving to Christine and Jeremy, who waved back.  He walked around and backed his car out of the overhang.

Despite the cautious hope they were displaying, all three of them knew this was a long shot.  Michael had no connection to Sean Hart other than the fact that apparently Sean liked to hack his computer for funsies.  This whole plan was likely doomed to fail.

But it was for Jeremy, which meant Michael would try his hardest anyway.

…

More people than Michael had expected showed up considering Sean Hart wasn’t supposed to be that well known in America.  They were meeting at some sort of conference building, the name of which Michael paid attention to long enough to type it into Google Maps.

But there was probably close to a couple hundred people there, meaning Michael wasn’t sure how he was actually supposed to get a chance to talk to this guy.  He and Christine had never looked into  _ why _ this guy was coming here— probably not a great move, now that he thought about it.  Michael had kind of figured he was revealing some kind of prototype or something.

So when he walked in and saw a bunch of people sitting in chairs in front of a makeshift stage, he wasn’t that surprised.

Michael took a seat in the middle, on the edge of the aisle, far away from those bodyguards that were making him a little uncomfortable, but close enough that he could reach the stage after whatever this was if he had to.

About half an hour later, Sean Hart walks up onto the stage.

Michael had seen pictures of Sean before, so he could easily pick out his brown-with-a-red-tint hair, his naturally smiling face, and— well, and he was the only person on the stage wearing a suit that nice.  Michael totally got how Jeremy had a crush on the 17-year-old version of this person.

Sean went on to introduce some kind of amazing advancement in virtual reality technology, and if Michael had actually been here to see this he would have asked if it worked for video games.

Clearly, Jeremy (and the internet) was not wrong about the guy being smart, because half of what he said was stuff that Michael couldn’t even understand.

He was getting into the nitty gritty of how the stuff worked and how they were going to advertise it and how long it would be before the product would be placed (cough cough very expensively) on the shelves.  And then he asked for a volunteer to experience it, just to show it was as realistic as he claimed. Hands shot up all over the place, and since Michael figured this was as good a time as any to try and talk to the guy, he raised his hand too.

He didn’t expect to get  _ called on. _

Michael walked up towards the stage, and a couple of people directed him towards where Sean was standing.  He swallowed, more than a little nervous to be the focus of the gazes of hundreds of people.

Sean handed Michael a pair of glasses to strap to his face, so he did.  “Okay,” he said, and Michael lifted the glasses a little so he could still see Sean talking.  “These are prototypes, so most of the options right now are pretty general. We have the obvious stuff like rollercoasters and hang gliding, but also some calmer things like floating on a boat or a vacation in Hawaii.  Have a preference?”

“Hawaii sounds nice.” Michael said.

“Alright.  Put those back on.”

Michael did, and suddenly the floor dropped out from under his feet and he was falling through the air.  He gave a yelp of surprise and heard laughter from a some people in the audience, and Sean himself.

Michael pulled the glasses off to see Sean chuckling.  “I’m sorry, I couldn’t resist.” he said. “Realistic though, right?”

“Uh— yeah, very,” Michael admitted, laughing a little himself, though mostly to keep up the facade since the thing stuck in his head was Jeremy’s comment: “He said he liked ‘playing with the people at the bottom.’”

Sean leaned in before Michael left the stage.  “Come here afterwards, kid, I have something to give you.”

Well.  Now there was no need for scrambling towards the stage and begging for a chance to talk to him.  Guess that made the slight humiliation from the moments prior okay. He wondered if this was some kind of volunteer prize or something.

Michael went back to his seat as Sean took the next five minutes to wrap things up.  Everyone was thanked for coming and Michael hung back until the room emptied.

Sean beckoned him up to the stage, and Michael walked up, two massive bodyguards following him onto the actual stage.

Before Michael could even get a word out Sean said: “You strike me as someone who either likes video games or movies.  Which one is it?”

“Oh.  Um, I like video games— sir.” Michael added as an afterthought, because if he wanted to ask this guy to come to an old rotting house with him, he should probably show him some respect.  That also meant he wasn’t going to mention that most teenagers liked video games or movies nowadays.

“Perfect.” Sean said.  “I wanted to thank you for being a good sport earlier, so I’m giving you this.”  One of the bodyguards handed him another pair of virtual reality glasses, and Sean handed it to Michael.  “It works with almost any video game. Plug it in to the controller and you can get a very realistic gaming experience.”

Michael’s mouth fell open a little.  “Are you serious?”

“Of course.”

“I— wow, thank you!” Michael said, grinning.  “This is amazing! But I uh—” Michael paused, remembering why he was here.  “I actually have a favor to ask you.”

“Oh?” Sean asked, tipping his head curiously.

“Yeah, my friend and I were researching you for a school project—”  No need for personal computers, he could use the ones in the library, right?  “And we found out about Jeremy Heere.”

A brief look of shock and sadness passed over Sean’s face.  “Oh.” he said.

“I’m sorry, I’m not trying to make you uncomfortable, but we found out something about how he died and we thought maybe you’d want to know, so—”

“You can’t possibly have anything new to show me, I already know everything.” Sean said softly, looking away.

“O-oh?” Michael said in confusion.

“I appreciate you coming here for this.  It means a lot to me.” Sean said. “But I already know everything about Jeremy’s death because I was there when it happened.”

Michael covered his mouth.  “Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean—”

“It’s alright.” Sean said, waving him off.  He sighed again. “I supposed I can explain, if you want to understand what you found?”

Jeremy would want to know.  Jeremy was desperate to know, but after hearing that…

“I— I mean—” Michael stammered.  “I am curious, but I couldn’t possibly ask you to—”

“It’s alright.” Sean said.  “I’ll tell you.”

…

Jeremy’s alarm woke him with a loud blaring, and he wanted to do anything else in the world but get out of bed.

“‘Jeremy, get up, you’re going to be late for school!’” Jeremy said quietly to himself in an imitation of a person who cared about that kind of thing.

Eventually he dragged himself out of bed and stumbled across the room.  He grabbed his favorite flannel shirt and jeans out of his dresser and his backpack from next to his door before heading downstairs to make breakfast.

He ate a bowl of cereal, ran back upstairs to brush his teeth, and then back downstairs to either make the bus or walk— he still hadn’t really decided.

His dad had fallen asleep on the couch the night before watching some stupid TV show, and Jeremy didn’t bother waking him.

He walked outside and made it halfway to the bus stop before the bus started coming down the street.

“Well, there goes that.” Jeremy said, continuing and turning at the intersection to head towards school.

As he passed by Sean’s house the door opened, and Jeremy’s chest did that thing where his heart sped up as Sean emerged.  He didn’t know why his best friend was suddenly making him so nervous, but he honestly wished it would go away, since Sean seemed to be starting to pick up on it.

“Hey, Sean!” Jeremy called.

Sean glanced over, and his face lit up, which was a little surprising.  “Hey, Jeremy, guess what?!” he called happily, running down the steps.

“What is it?” Jeremy asked, as Sean fell into step beside him and the two started their route towards Hell— excuse him, school.

“I have something to show you.  I just finished it last night and I swear it’s the best thing I’ve invented in a long time!”

Sean sounded so excited that Jeremy couldn’t help but grin back.  “Sure! Where is it?”

“Not now, after school!”

Jeremy’s eyes widened.  “It’s an after school thing?  Well then it must be a really big deal.”

“It is!” Sean said, somehow grinning even bigger—

…

_ What the hell?  What just happened?  Jeremy whirled back and forth in a panic, suddenly unable to recognize his surroundings.  Where was he? _

_ Well, okay, he was in a house.  But he had never seen it before and it looked really old.  There was a bunch of broken glass and ripped paper on the floor and— _

_ AND HOLY SHIT HE’S FLOATING HE’S FLOATING WHAT THE FUCK?! _

_ Jeremy screamed so loud they could probably hear him in New York. _

_ What the hell was going on? _

…

—which was just freaking adorable.

Honestly, there were days Jeremy thought his best friend was the greatest person on the planet.

The walk to school always passed much faster when Jeremy got to walk with Sean.  Jeremy usually let Sean take the lead and jabber on about whatever new invention has his so excited, but this time, as soon as he gets close to reveal anything he stops, clearly wanting to save it as a surprise.

They made it to school with just enough time for Jeremy to get to class before the bell rang as he walked in the door.

His history teacher was talking about a really important project that they were going to start the next day, so today she was handing out rubrics and going over all the guidelines.

Then came the dreaded subject of partners.  Yes, this was a group project. Jeremy was paired up with two people he barely knew and who spent the rest of the class talking.  He doubted they would do anything different the following day when they actually had to start the project. His next class was English, and they were in the middle of reading some kind of book that Jeremy was trying really hard to be interested in.  (He was failing.)

Third period was math, and the one class all day that Jeremy had with Sean. Honestly, Jeremy wished he had just about any other class with him, because A, it was math, and B, Sean had a tendency to talk to him when he saw him, which resulted in Jeremy not doing that great in the overall class.  He had asked Sean a couple of times to stop, but Sean probably just forgot.

Fourth period was P.E., which was Jeremy’s favorite class,  _ obviously. _  (That was sarcasm.)  At least he was done with the Pacer Test for the rest of the year.  That had been the last class. No, today was something only slightly better: dodgeball.  It wasn’t like everyone ganged up on him, though Lord knows Jeremy was enough of a loser to warrant such a thing.  No, he was just terrible at dodging anything. At least that meant he could spend most of the class sitting out, and therefore sitting down.

After P.E. was lunch, which, thankfully, Jeremy also had with Sean, otherwise he would have no one to sit with.  Sean spent most of the lunch period talking about this joke he had played on a Freshman, while Jeremy was content to just watch him talk.  It made him really happy to see Sean excited. His face lit up, and his eyes got a (usually mischievous) gleam in them.

All but one of the classes Jeremy had after lunch were electives, but of course his last required class had to be just before the end of the day.Luckily, Junior year was Biology in the science sense, and Jeremy actually found that stuff vaguely interesting.  The teacher was talking about how they would get to dissect a pig next week, which would probably be more fun if the very idea didn’t make him sick. Hey, maybe he could fake an illness next week.

After school Jeremy was about to board the bus when Sean caught his arms.

“Come on, I have to show you the invention!” he called.

“You can’t show me on the bus?” Jeremy asked, following anyway.

“Nah, we have to walk to it.”

“Oh, is it a big one?”

“It’s a secret one.”

“Oooh!” Jeremy said in his ‘We’re being so secretive’ voice.  “Where is it?”

“Follow me.” Sean said, and he led Jeremy off school grounds and away from both of their houses.

It was about five minutes of moving in seemingly random directions before Jeremy spoke up again.

“Where are we going?”

“Hang on, we’re almost there.” Sean said.  He turned onto a dead-end street and gestured to Jeremy excitedly as he started running.

“Woah, slow down!” Jeremy yelled, taking off after him.

To Jeremy’s surprise, Sean finally stopped at the very end of the road at an old house.

“Come on.” Sean said, moving towards the back.

“Uh, Sean?  Are you sure this place is safe?” Jeremy asked.  “It looks really old, and that part of the ceiling looks like it could actually collapse.”

“Oh, it’s fine.” Sean said.  “Come on, it’s in here.”

Jeremy walked hesitantly into the house.  “Are you su—” He stopped when he noticed a table that seemed to be covered in hundreds of tiny pills.

“Uh, Sean, hate to break it to you, but medicine is not a new invention.” Jeremy said carefully, walking over to the table.

“They’re not medicine, they’re Super Quantum Unit Intel Processors.”

Jeremy blinked, and then blinked again.  “They’re wha-?”

“Here, I’ll show you.” Sean grabbed one of the pills and handed it to Jeremy.  “Try it.”

“Uh…” Jeremy moved back a half-step.  It wasn’t like Sean had never tested inventions on him before, but something about this one seemed different.  “I don’t know.”

“Just try it, you’ll see.”

Jeremy bit his lip, and then sighed before swallowing the pill.  “Okay, now what?”

“Now you drink this.” Sean reached into his backpack and pulled out a bottle of Mountain Dew.

Jeremy took it hesitantly.  “Seriously?” he asked.

“Yeah.  And I think I finally worked out the bugs, so you should only feel some mild discomfort.”

“Wait, what?”

“Come on!” Sean said excitedly.

Jeremy looked down at the soda.  “Sean, what is this thing?”

“Jeremy, come on!  I still have to test these things, and you don’t mind that kind of stuff!”

“Well, I mean if it could physically hurt me—”

“Jeremy!” Sean snapped, suddenly sounding very angry.  Jeremy stumbled back, holding his hands up.

“Okay, okay.” he said.  “Hang on.”

Jeremy took a hesitant sip of the Mountain Dew.

“Okay, how do you feel?” Sean said, bouncing excitedly.

“Uh… hungry?” Jeremy said, trying to take stock but not coming up with anything.

Sean’s face fell.  “Aww, really?”

“I mean, it tastes… minty I guess?  What’s supposed to happen?”

Sean sighed again.  “I guess I have more to do, but these are called Super Quantum Unit Intel Processors.  SQUIPs for short. They’re supposed to implant in the users brain and tell them what to do.”

“What?!” Jeremy burst out.  “I just ate a supercomputer?!”

“Well, no, it’s apparently not working.” Sean said, completely glossing over Jeremy’s panic.  “But yeah, you were supposed to. SQUIPs are going to be marketed as Supercomputers who help you accomplish your goals, and they can do stuff to help the user achieve them such as shocks and physical control of the user, stuff like that.”

_ “WHAT?!” _ Jeremy asked, jerking backwards.  “Are you crazy?! That’s awful!”

“It’s supposed to be, that’s the point.” Sean said.  “See, that’s what they’ll be marketed as, but I have a different goal in mind.”

“Wh-what?”

“Jeremy, if I can actually get SQUIPs to powerful people, such as the president or other global leaders, I can control much of what goes on in the world, in the economy, progress, what gets made and when, even education.”

“Y-you— what are you talking about?  That’s insane. You’re— Sean, you’re scaring me.” Jeremy started backing up, towards the door.  If he could just get out of here—

“Jeremy, where are you going?” Sean asked, sounding genuinely confused.

Jeremy froze.

“Are you not going to help me?”

“What?  N-no! You’re not—” Jeremy pointed desperately at Sean.  “There is something wrong with you, that’s not— I’m calling the police!”

That was the wrong thing to say.

Sean’s face darkened in anger in a way Jeremy had never seen before.  Jeremy stumbled backwards again and tripped on a loose board coming out of the floor.

“Jeremy.” Sean said, and Jeremy was pretty sure he actually whimpered.  “Are you going to help me or not?”

Jeremy couldn’t even find the words to say anything, and a second later Sean started running towards him.

Jeremy screamed and turned to try and run from the house before Sean caught him by his arm and dragged him towards the part of the ceiling that had looked dangerous earlier.

About halfway there Jeremy stopped fighting and grabbed at his head, because suddenly someone was saying “Calibration in Process” and Jeremy was pretty sure he had never felt a headache this bad.

He vaguely registered Sean saying something like ‘Oh, so it  _ is _ working.’ before he was dropped and someone said “Discomfort level may increase.’

At this point Jeremy started screaming.

_ Accessing Neural Memory _

_ Accessing Muscle Memory _

_ Access Procedure Complete _

_ Jeremy Heere _

Sean kicked at the floor and something fell on Jeremy’s head.  He was pretty sure it was the ceiling.

_ Welcome to your Super Quantum Unit Intel Processor. _

_ Your SQUIP. _

That was the last thing Jeremy heard.

…

“And that’s what happened.”

Michael was still trying to understand what was currently happening, but there was one thing registering:

“Oh my God.  You killed him.”

“It was necessary.” Sean said sadly.  “He knew too much.”

“You— you’re like— you’re insane.”  Michael was about to turn tail and run for his fucking life  _ (literally) _ when he backed into two guards standing behind him.

“I have always suspected there was something wrong with me mentally if that’s what you’re asking.” Sean said casually.  “And now, I’m afraid, you know too much as well.”

Before Michael could scream for help one of the guards slapped a hand over his mouth and the other spread his legs and grabbed his arms.

“So you’ll be coming back to Japan with us.” Sean said, turning around.  How calm he looked was terrifying. “As soon as I succeed with what I have planned I’ll decide if I want to let you go or kill you.  Thank you, that will be all.” he said to the guards before walking backstage.

Michael looked up at the person above him just before a massive hand slammed into the side of his head and the face disappeared.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (In case it wasn’t clear, the part where it skips to Jeremy alone in the house is what Jeremy remembers.)


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Christine is starting to freak out just as much as Jeremy is— not that she’d tell him that.

“Where is he?” Jeremy asked.  “He should at least be back by now saying Sean’s not coming, right?”

“I’m sure Michael’s fine.” Christine said, mainly to calm Jeremy down, although in truth, she was also  _ freaking out. _  It was 6PM, the event was supposed to end at noon; by even the furthest stretch of the imagination Michael should be back by now.  “Maybe they had a lot to talk about.”

“Christine!” Jeremy called desperately.  “Something’s  _ wrong! _ ”

“He’s  _ fine.” _ Christine interrupted.  “We just have to— have to—” Christine’s phone changed to 6:01.

“Oh my God, we have to call the police.” Jeremy said.

“We can’t!  We can’t tell them what’s wrong because—” Christine cried, but was cut off as her phone started ringing.  It was her mother.

Christine picked up nervously and put the phone on speaker.  “Mom?”

_ “Where are you?!” _ her mother screamed.   _ “You told me you were at Michael’s, and now his mothers are here saying he’s supposed to be here!” _

Christine and Jeremy exchanged a wide eyed gaze.  “I’m at Play Rehearsal.” Christine said smoothly.

_ “Christine Arcelia Canigula, do not lie to me!  It is a Saturday and it is six in the evening. Where are you?” _

Shoot.

“I’m— I’ll be home in a second, Mom.”

_ “Answer my question, young lady!  Where are—” _

Christine hung up.

“Chrissy?” Jeremy said nervously.

“I have to figure this out, Jeremy.  I’ll be back when I can.” Christine said, just as nervously as he had.

Jeremy nodded, biting his lip.  “Okay, Chrissy. Make sure Michael’s okay, alright?  I trust you.”

Christine nodded again and ran out of the house.  She snuck around through the overhang and behind the Dead-End sign before going up to her house and knocking tentatively on the front door.

Her mother opened it a second later.  “Christine!” she screamed, pulling her in for a hug.  “What were you doing? Where have you been? Where is Michael?”

“I’m sorry, Mom.” Christine said.  “But I think Michael’s in trouble.”

“Why?” Analyn’s voice came from behind them.  She and Rachel, as well as Christine’s father, were standing there, looking worried.

Everyone walked into the living room, and after Michael’s moms sat on the couch and Christine’s parents took the loveseat, Christine took a deep breath, and explained— well, a dumbed down version that didn’t include a ghost.  She said that Michael had gone to see Sean Hart because he was interested in the product he was showing, and was supposed to come back at noon, but he hadn’t.

“But why would he lie to us about going to see this person?” Rachel asked, sounding confused and a little angry.

“Um… because he had to be 18 to go.” Christine said, making sure it came off as guilty.

“He  _ lied about his age?” _ Rachel snapped.

Christine bit her lip and nodded, making sure she looked nervous.  “He thought you’d say no.”

“He was right.” Rachel said angrily.  “And you don’t know where he is now?”

Christine shook her head, not having to fake the worry at all.

“Okay.” Rachel took Analyn’s hand, who looked like she was about to pass out.  “I’m going to call the police.”

Analyn took a deep breath and nodded, rising to follow her wife.  “Is there a phone in the kitchen?” she asked quietly.

“Yes.” Peter said, standing up himself to show them where it was.

“Um, Mom?” Christine asked.

Rebecca looked over and raised an eyebrow.

Christine laughed nervously.  “Can I—”

“Absolutely not.  You’re grounded.”

“But Mom, Michael’s—”

“Michael will be found by the police.  Go to your room.”

“Mom!”

_ “Now.” _

Christine walked upstairs to her room, biting her lip hard enough to draw blood.

She got no sleep that night.

…

Instead she snuck out.

Look, she  _ could not _ tell anyone about Jeremy.  And that meant they didn’t know the seriousness of the fact that something was  _ wrong. _

The first thing Christine did was go back to Michael’s house and grab the spare key to get down into his room.  She knew that Michael’s parents were staying at her house tonight, so no one would stop her. She looked around for any sign that he’d been there recently, and when she found none she grabbed his computer and walked the distance back to Jeremy.

“Christine!” Jeremy was hovering in the same spot she’d left him.  “Did you find Michael? Is he okay?”

“No, I didn’t find him.  I thought I’d try and compare results on his computer and my phone when we looked up Sean Hart.”

Jeremy raised an eyebrow.  “That’s your plan?”

“I don’t know!” Christine cried, throwing up her hands.  “I feel like we don’t have a lot of options here!”

She set Michael’s computer down, because that idea was stupid and she knew it.  “My mom grounded me. So I have to leave before she wakes up.” she said with a sigh.

“Okay.” Jeremy said.  He sniffed, and Christine realized he was crying.

“Jeremy?” she said, looking at him in concern.

“This is all my fault.” Jeremy said, putting his head in his hands.

“Hey, no it’s not.” Christine said, wishing more than ever that she could give him a hug.

“Yes it is!  I was the one who wanted to see Sean, and then Michael went to go get him, and now we don’t have any idea where he is!  What if someone hurt him?”

“I’m sure Michael’s fine, Jeremy, maybe he just got horribly lost!” Christine said hopefully.

Jeremy sniffed again, looking up a little.  “Really?”

“I…” Christine sighed.  “No, not really.” She didn’t want to share her theory, which was that Sean was not a great person and had done something to Michael himself.  Jeremy didn’t need more things to worry about right now.

At a loss of what to do, Christine picked up Michael’s computer and opened it.

Jeremy floated over and looked over Christine’s shoulder before the screen booted up and showed Michael’s conversation on some video game.  Christine closed it out just before Jeremy said: “WAIT!”

“Geez, what?!” Christine asked, nearly closing the computer in surprise.

“Open it again!”

Christine did so, and Jeremy pointed desperately at one word on the screen.

“SQUIP!” he cried.  “I— I  _ know _ that word!”

“What?” Christine asked, taking a minute to read the conversation.

“I thought—” Christine stammered after she finished.  “Michael says the guy was probably just high, right?”

“No way.  No, that—” Jeremy paused and grabbed at his head.   _ “Ow, _ I— I know that word.”

“You’re saying Sean actually built these things?”

“I wouldn’t put it past him, he definitely  _ could.” _ Jeremy said.  “And apparently they’re a bigger deal now— Christine!  We have to find these things!”

“What?” Christine asked.  “I thought we were supposed to be finding Michael?”

“We are, but—” Jeremy groaned.  “Christine, I don’t know how to explain it, but— I— I’m  _ sure.” _

“Sure about what?”

“I don’t know!  Look, we need— we need more information.  It says someone at school who suddenly became popular, right?”

Christine glanced back down at the screen.  “Yeah.”

“Do you know where you can find Rich Goranski on a Saturday night?”

Christine was about to either answer no or home in bed when both her phone and Michael’s computer went off with a notification.

Jeremy leaned forward and looked at the screen again.  “Do you think—” Jeremy stopped abruptly, and his eyes widened.  “Jesus Christ.”

Christine leaned forward to see many different notifications.

 

_ GUYS RICH SET A FIRE AND BURNED JAKE’S HOUSE DOWN! _

_ DUDE RICH BURNED DOWN JAKE DILLINGER’S HOUSE! _

_ RICH BURNED DOWN JAKE’S HOUSE AND FLED THE SCENE!  HE WENT TO BOMBAY! _

_ RICH GORANSKI BURNED DOWN JAKE’S HOUSE AND NOW HE’S DEAD! _

 

Aside from one or two outliers talking about Rich being gay, everyone was saying pretty much the same thing: Rich Goranski had burned down Jake Dillinger’s house.

“Maybe I could try the hospital?” Christine asked in shock.

“Be careful!” Jeremy called.  “Don’t vanish on me if you can, try to tell me what’s happening?”

“Of course.” Christine said, running outside with a wave over her shoulder.  She went back inside the foyer and grabbed the car keys.

“Sorry Mom and Dad,” she said to the grounding she was going to get until she died.

Then she ran back out to the garage, started the car, and drove off.

Christine arrived at the hospital fifteen minutes later, and walked up to the man sitting at the front desk.  “Hello, I’m here to see my cousin, Richard Goranski?” Christine figured it was likely they would let family in right now, but no one else.

The man raised an eyebrow.  “You’re his cousin?”

“I’m adopted.  My family is moving, and I’m staying here with him while my parents get everything sorted out.”

The man nodded before tapping a few times on his computer and glanced back up at Christine.  “He’s not available for visiting until at least tomorrow morning.”

“Okay,” Christine said, and walked over and sat down in a chair, her leg bouncing with extra energy.  She didn’t think she could fall asleep if she tried.

Instead, Christine sat and bounced her leg as the sun slowly brightened the outside as the hours passed.

Eventually, a doctor came out and told her she could go in, but Rich was on medication and asleep.

“Thank you.” Christine said, managing to sound properly worried.

The doctor gave her the room number, Christine went and found it, thankfully empty.  “Geez, this is so stupid in so many ways.” she muttered to herself, before walking over and slapping Rich across he face.

Rich cried out as he jerked awake.  “Wh-wha— Christine?” he asked as his gaze fell on her, his voice very slurred from all of that medication he was on.

“Rich, I need you to explain Squips to me.” Christine said.

Rich blinked, like he was trying to process what she’d just said.  “What?”

“I need you to explain Squips to me.”

“How do you know about—”

“It doesn’t matter and I don’t have time to explain.  What do they do, how do they work, and  _ where _ did you get one?  That part’s important.”

“Um—” Rich blinked slowly again.

“Rich, please.  Michael’s in trouble, and I’m starting to think it’s got something to do with Squips.”

“Why should I help Michael?” Rich asked, but he looked dazed, like he wasn’t quite sure what he was saying.

Christine wanted to scream.  “Because you’ve been a total asshole to him for two years so now you owe him one!” she snapped.

The cursing seemed to get his attention— Christine didn’t really do that.

“Um— okay,” Rich said, still blinking like he was trying to wake himself up.

Christine spent the next half hour having an agonizingly slow conversation with Rich about everything he knew about Squips.  He explained where he got one first, due to Christine insisting that that part was important. Unfortunately, the answer was some stranger behind a Payless at the mall, and that was definitely not the only place to get them.

He talked about what the Squips primary function was supposed to be, and then what they were actually like, such as shocks and controlling and abuse.  Christine honestly had to admit she was starting to feel really bad for Rich. When he mentioned the shocks she actually cut into his explanation to apologize that something like that had happened to him.  Rich also told her that Mountain Dew Red would turn the Squips off, but he had no idea where to get it.

“What if someone was dead?” Christine asked suddenly, surprised by the own words coming out of her mouth.

Rich blinked at her (he was doing that a lot).  “What?”

“What if the person who had a Squip was dead?”

“Wh- then they’d be dead, and therefore not affected?”

“Um… okay, thanks.”

Rich gaped at her for a second.  “Yeah, sure.”

With that, Christine thanked him, promised she would come back to visit as soon as she could, and left the room with Rich already falling back asleep.

As she was leaving her phone went off in her pocket.

It was her mother.

Christine shut her phone off.

…

Christine parked the car the next street over and cut through somebody’s backyard to get back to Jeremy.

_ “Jeremy!” _ she hissed as she crept in.  Jeremy whirled around from where he was looking out a window, but thankfully didn’t scream.  “There are police cars in your driveway.” he whispered back.

“I know.  They’re either talking to my parents or Michael’s parents or both.  Probably both.” Christine said.

“What did you find out?” Jeremy asked.

Christine now relayed everything she knew about Squips, including her idea that maybe Jeremy had one.

Jeremy blinked in surprise.  “What makes you say that? Besides, I thought you were supposed to be able to see those things.  I’ve been alone here my whole— death.”

“That’s the point.  It probably works differently with death.  But think about it. We think the whole reason you’re a ghost is unfinished business, right?  How are you supposed to complete that unfinished business if you’re trapped in a house? What if the reason you’re trapped here isn’t because you’re a ghost but because your Squip isn’t letting you leave?”

“I— wow.  You figured that out all on your own?” Jeremy asked.

“It’s just a theory.  But unfortunately, the only way to get rid of them is Mountain Dew Red, and it was discontinued and we don’t know where—”

“Michael keeps a bunch of old soda from the 90s in his basement.” Jeremy blurted.  “He found them mostly for me.”

Christine stared at him for a moment.  “I’ll be right back again.” She sprinted off to the car once more.

“I’m gonna lose ten pounds by the time this is over.” she muttered to herself.

Ten minutes later found her back at the Mell house, and less than minute after that found her back in Michael’s room.  There was a mini fridge over by his TV filled with Surge, Crystal Pepsi, and yes, Mountain Dew Red. There were actually multiple of each, so Christine made a mental note to grab a Mountain Dew Red for Rich later and grabbed one for Jeremy.

She parked in the same spot and ran through the same backyard as last time with the soda clutched in her hands.

“You got it!” Jeremy called, and then his face fell.  “But I… can’t drink that.”

Christine smashed the bottle on the ground.

Jeremy blinked down at it in shock.  “Great. You broke it.”

“Wrong!” Christine cried.  “I killed it!”

Jeremy raised an eyebrow disbelievingly.  “I don’t think that’s how it works.”

“It’s worth a try!  And I don’t have any other ideas, so…”

Jeremy couldn’t come up with anything to say to that, so he reached down—

And pulled up a ghost-version of a full bottle of Mountain Dew Red.

He and Christine stared at each other for a moment.  “Promise me you’ll kill some chocolate later?” Jeremy asked.

“I promise.  Drink up.”

Jeremy did so.

“Do you feel any different?  Does it hurt?” Christine asked.

“I mean, I can’t feel pain, so I dunno?”

“Try and leave the house.” Christine said, running out to the backyard.

Jeremy hesitantly floated over to the door and hesitantly held up a hand.  It went right through.

Jeremy, for a second when he got to the backyard, just hovered there, taking in everything around him.

“Jeremy, we gotta go.” Christine reminded him.

“Where are we going?” Jeremy asked, sounding determined as he floated to the car, low to the ground so anyone who happened to see would think he was walking.

“Jeremy…” Christine said quietly.  “I think Sean kidnapped Michael.”

“Sean—” Jeremy went deathly (shut up) still.

“What?” Christine asked.

“Sean killed me.” Jeremy whispered.

“What?!”

“I— I just remembered—” Jeremy stopped.  He whirled back to Christine. “We have to help Michael!”

Christine was still trying to process what he said, but he was right, so she got into the car and pulled out her phone.

“What are you doing?” Jeremy asked, floating through the car door.

“Getting directions to the airport.  I have no idea when Sean’s leaving, but he’s probably not letting Michael go before he does.” Christine said.  “Are you gonna float along behind the car, or…”

“I’ll keep up.” Jeremy said.  “Don’t worry, just drive.”

“Okay.” Christine said.  She started the car and was about to drive off when Jeremy spoke up, softly.

“Christine.”

Christine glanced over.  “Yeah?”

“Do you think I love Michael?”

Christine did a double take.  “Woah,  _ what?” _

“I’m really worried about him.” Jeremy said.  “And he’s in this situation right now because of me, and— and when he vanished I just kind of realized that— I mean I—”

“Jeremy, I can’t answer that question for you.” Christine said.  “That’s your feelings. You have to figure them out yourself.” She leaned forward so he had to look her in the eyes.  “But Jeremy, this is still not your fault.”

Jeremy bit his lip, hard.  “Okay.” he said quietly. “Okay.”

“You ready to go?”

Jeremy smiled at her, determination in his eyes.  “Yeah. Let’s go save our best friend.”

…

They arrived at the airport at 11AM.

Jeremy made absolutely sure he moved his feet so it looked like he was walking like a person, and that he didn’t bump into anyone.  Christine felt she could safely say it was absolutely terrifying for both of them.

“Um, hi.” Christine said as she walked up to the man at the counter.  “I don’t suppose you could tell me what flight Sean Hart is on? I’m a big fan.” she managed to get a blush onto her face.

The man raised an eyebrow as if to say ‘Are you kidding me?’

Christine sighed.  “Yeah, I figured. Cummon, Jeremy, we gotta go.”

Jeremy managed to give a fairly believable sigh himself, before following Christine far enough away that the man looked back at what he had been doing.

“Now what?” Jeremy hissed.

“You’re not gonna like it.”

“What?”

“We walk around and look for him and hope he hasn’t left yet.”

Jeremy groaned and put his head in his hands.  A second later he gave a determined sigh and looked back up at Christine.  “Where do we start?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got the ‘killing an object’ thing from The Amazing World of Gumball, where Tobias turns a stick into the ghost of a stick.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Michael had to admit, this was not the best situation he had ever been in.

Michael could say with relative certainty that he did not like being kidnapped.  The conditions could definitely be worse, he would admit. He probably had it a lot better than other kidnapping victims in his practically five star hotel room with room service through guards and lots of amazing food from great restaurants brought to him whenever he wanted it.

But on the other hand, they had taken his every means of contact with the outside world, his friends and his moms were probably worried sick, and oh yeah, there was the fact that he was at the mercy of his best friend’s crush, who was also his murderer.  Double cheeseburgers could only go so far.

“Anything we can get you?” the guards at the door asked for the first time that day.

“Can I get my one phone call?” Michael asked.  Neither of them looked amused, and Michael shrugged.  “Worth a sixth shot. Can I get a timeframe on when I get out of here?”

Neither of them said anything again, and Michael groaned.  “Can I get the time?”

One of the guards looked at his watch.  “It’s six in the morning.”

Michael perked up.  “Great. Can I go to sleep?”

“No.” the other one said.

Michael groaned again and flopped back on the bed he was sitting on.  “I’m just making it clear, that you two are not my favorite people. And that’s a high insult coming from me.”

The guards still said nothing, and Michael was struck by the desire to see some kind of reaction from them.  “Hey, what are your names?” he asked.

They said nothing.  Shocker.

“Alright, but if you don’t tell me I’m gonna have to make them up.”

Still no response.

“Okay…” Michael pointed at the first guard.  “You’re really boring, so imma call you Paul.”  (He remembered a second later that Paul was Jeremy’s dad’s name, and he might take offense to that, but it was too late now.)  He pointed at the second guard. “And you look like you could be a wild partier if you tried, so you’re gonna be Fernando.”

Michael saw Fernando’s lip curl slightly in disgust, and he grinned.  Mission success.

“Do you guys have any childhood trauma you wanna share?  Like, why’d you decide to work for a murderer? Can this turn into one of those side plots where I break through to you and help you change your lives for the better?” Michael grinned wider and pointed at the two.  “Don’t leave me hangin’, Fernando.”

Fernando actually rolled his eyes, and Michael had never been more impressed in his ability to irritate people.

The door opened and in walked Sean, Who Michael hadn’t seen since he’d first been kidnapped some unknown amount of time ago.

“Hey Sean!” Michael called.  “You think you can come back later?  Your guards were just about to open up to me about their tragic backstories.”

Sean raised an eyebrow at Fernando.

“We were not, sir.” Fernando said.

The fact that he had to clarify made Michael fall backwards onto the bed he was laughing so hard.

He laughter was cut off by Paul smacking him in the throat, causing Michael to start wheezing as he tried to catch his breath.

“We’re leaving at noon.” Sean said.  “Make sure he’s ready to go.” With that, he left.

Michael looked up nervously at the guards.  “Any chance I can get my one phone call?”

…

Well, Michael had never felt so insulted in his life.  “I am not riding to Japan in a suitcase!” he snapped.

“Yes,” Paul said.  “You are.”

Fernando calmly grabbed Michael’s hands and pinned them behind his back before shoving his face into the poles sticking out of the back of the suitcase.  “Ow!” Michael cried. “I was so wrong about you being the fun one!”

Fernando shoved his arms in behind his head just as roughly.

Eventually they managed to shove Michael inside of the suitcase and keep him still long enough to tape his mouth shut and zip it up.

For a long period of time after that Michael— see: the suitcase— was handled as if it was full of rocks.  Meaning he was picked up and placed (very roughly) onto many hard surfaces. They were probably those cart things that carried suitcases to cars, and they were far from comfortable between the layers of suitcase and thin carpet.

And as much as he tried, he couldn’t manage to get his arms out from underneath his back to get the tape off his mouth.  He was shoved unceremoniously onto something else, and then he heard the familiar sound of a trunk shutting.

_ Oh God I don’t want to puke in here. _

Michael tried to reach the zippers and maybe scoot them along to get out of the suitcase, but it was too small for him to move his arms enough to get there.

The car started moving and Michael felt his breathing start to pick up.   _ Oh my God he’s going to take me to Japan and I’m going to be stuck there until this maniac manages to take over the fucking world with his horrible abusive computers and oh my God oh my God— _

_ Stop.  Deep breaths.  You cannot afford a panic attack, you have to figure a way out of this mess. _

_ Plus it would probably be really exhausting and painful here.  I don’t know, I’ve never had a panic attack in a suitcase before. _

Michael breathed in and out for four seconds four times, and managed to calm down enough to think.  What could he do?

Well, not much unless he could manage to move his hands.  So Michael spent the majority of the car ride ignoring the nauseous feeling in his stomach and trying to rock back and forth enough to free his hands.  Key word  _ trying, _ because the suitcase was too damn small.

Eventually the car stopped.  It had been about quarter to 11 when they left, meaning based on his horrible sense of time, he probably had about an hour to get out of this situation— no, less, because he would be put in the cargo hold.  Fuck.

The trunk opening, and Michael tried to scream through the tape, but he doubted anyone heard him.

The suitcase was set down and Michael was dragged along, hitting many bumps along the way.

At one point there was a pause before Michael was picked up and put down once again before feeling the whole suitcase begin to slide forward.  It felt like a conveyor belt. Wait, security! He wasn’t going to get past that, right?

Suddenly, Michael heard a zipper unzip and a small object was dropped inside the suitcase.  What the fuck was that? And what did it do?

Whatever conveyor belt or something he was on stopped and Michael held his breath, waiting for alarms… that didn’t come.

He was lifted down from the conveyor belt just after the tiny thing was taken out of the suitcase.  Well shit. That thing was Michael’s new least favorite invention of all time.

Michael was dragged again, for a longer distance this time, and left at some unknown spot.  And then someone picked up the suitcase, just before he was dropped, knocking the wind out of him as someone said: “Geez, what is in this thing?”

When Michael caught his breath he realized dropping him must have done the trick, because his arm had finally shifted to his side, and so with a movement that was sure to cause some kind of rug burn, Michael managed to get his arm up and yank the tape off his mouth just as he was set down again.

“Help!” he screamed.  “Hey! Can anyone hear me?!”

No one seemed to notice anything at first, but Michael kept screaming.  “Hey, I’m in the suitcase! HEY!”

“What’s that?” came a few nearby voices.  “What’s going on?”

And then one very familiar voice yelled: “Michael?!” and a second later the zippers came undone, and Michael was face to face with Christine.

“Oh my God, Michael!” Christine screamed, pulling Michael into a hug as everyone around them was gaping and Michael was blinking really fast trying to get his bearings and adjust to his new surroundings.

But he must have been delusional or something, because that looked like Jeremy right behind Christine.  “Wha— Jer? How’d you get out of the house?”

“Uh… my dad unground me,” Jeremy said, glancing around quickly.

Oh yeah, they were surrounded by hundreds of people.  Jeremy could tell him later.

“Michael, what happened, are you okay?” Christine asked, looking him over like a concerned mother and probably seeing the many bruises from riding around in a suitcase.

Michael looked at Jeremy, biting his lip.  “I have to tell you something about Sean,” he said quietly.

“It’s okay, Michael,” Jeremy replied.  “I already know.”

An incredibly loud sound interrupted them, and all three of them whirled around as everyone started running and screaming.  Paul and Fernando were standing on the other side of the airport, having just fired a warning shot from a gun into the floor.

“Fernando, I expected better from you,” Michael hissed, because he was panicking and if this past morning had taught him anything, he was very sarcastic when his life was in danger.  A second later Michael grabbed Christine’s hand— she had frozen— and started running, dragging her in a zigzag pattern across the airport.

“Who’s Fernando?” Jeremy screamed, clearly scared for Michael and Christine but also the least concerned in the general vicinity for obvious reasons.

They managed to make it around a corner, just before Michael ran smack into Sean Hart.

Christine screamed and pulled her and Michael back through Jeremy, causing them all to shiver.

And putting Jeremy right in Sean’s line of sight.

For the next couple seconds everyone stared at each other, looking back and forth.  No one seemed to know quite what to do.

Until alarms started going off overhead, and that seemed to spur everyone into action.  Sean dove straight through Jeremy towards Christine and Michael, and Jeremy did just about the only thing he could— he hovered right on top of Sean until he was shivering too much to do anything.

“J-J-Jeremy, g-get off of me!” Sean snapped.

“Leave my friends alone!” Jeremy snapped right back, as both Michael and Christine tried to comprehend exactly what they were seeing— their eyes couldn’t quite do it.

“Oh, s-so they’re your f-f-friends?” Sean said.  “I s-suppose that explains how Michael knew about y-you.”

“You fucking killed me, you asshole!” Jeremy screamed, completely ignoring Sean’s previous statement.

“Y-you refused to help me!”

“Because you were being insane!”

“Just b-b-because I came up with something you c-couldn’t c-c-comprehend—”

“It was not about comprehension, Sean!  Trying to take over the world with supercomputers is not a  _ sane _ plan!”

“We should go find some guards or something.” Michael whispered to Christine.

Christine nodded, and they both jumped up as Jeremy and Sean continued to scream at each other and ran back around the corner.  Hey, it wasn’t like Sean could do much to Jeremy anymore.

There were dozens of guards all apprehending Paul and Fernando, while dozens of others were pointing guns at them.

“Hey, over here!” Michael called, and heads turned in their direction.  Both he and Christine pointed towards where Jeremy and Sean were still in some ghost-inclusive version of a tête-à-tête.

Guards were already running in that direction, only for all of them to do a double take when they saw Sean and Jeremy.

“Grab him!” Jeremy screamed, still trying to stay on top of Sean.

Eventually one of them moved forward and Jeremy floated backwards long enough so he and two other guards could apprehend Sean, who after a couple seconds, seemed to finally understand he was beaten and stopped struggling.

“Were those his guards?“ someone asked Michael, pointing back to Paul and Fernando.  Michael nodded.

“Hey!” Jeremy cried, and all the guards turned to stare at him again.  Jeremy pointed at Sean. “He invented a thing called a SQUIP! It’s a horrible abusive supercomputer and he’s trying to take over the world with it!  You need to find all of them and get rid of them!”

The guards exchanged an ‘I have no idea what to think but I definitely don’t believe this kid’ look.

_ “I’m a fucking ghost!” _ Jeremy snapped.   _ “Stretch your suspension of disbelief!” _

The guards all exchanged another look.  Michael had no idea what this one meant.

But something about it seemed to affect Jeremy, because suddenly he gasped.

“Jeremy?” Michael called, turning to him in concern.  Jeremy turned and looked back at Michael, and so many emotions flashed across his face— horror, sadness, fear, relief, something else— that Michael couldn’t even begin to decipher them or what they meant.

But what happened was that Jeremy quickly floated over and hovered in front of Christine.  “Hey, you’re the best okay?” he said, and Christine blinked in confusion.

“What?” she asked.

“Thanks for being my friend.  You mean so much to me.”

“Jeremy, what are you talking about?”

Instead of answering, Jeremy floated over to Michael.  “I’m so glad you’re okay,” he whispered.

“Y-yeah, me too?  Jeremy, what’s wrong?”

“I love you.” Jeremy said.

_ “What?” _

“And I’m going to do something now, if that’s okay?”

Michael was shocked enough that all he could do was nod.  Jeremy leaned forward and put his lips right where they would be touching Michael’s if he had a physical form, but instead of cold or shivering, Michael felt a warmth spread throughout him.

Jeremy leaned back again, and Michael was shocked enough that “I love you too,” slipped out.

Jeremy grinned brighter than the sun could shine.  “Oh, good.” he said happily. “I hoped so.” But in the next second his smile turned so incredibly sad.  “And, because I love you, don’t wait for me okay?”

“What does that mean?”  Michael asked. “Jeremy, what does that mean?”

“My unfinished business is resolved now,” Jeremy said quietly.

“S-so… what?”

Jeremy smiled sadly again, and leaned forward in their sort-of-kiss one more time.  This time Michael’s eyes slipped shut.

When he opened his eyes again Jeremy was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. You have my full permission to yell at me if you want to.


	11. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now they must deal with the aftermath.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did I mention I’m really sorry?

_ Michael was so  _ dead.

_ What made him think dumping a slushie on Rich’s head was a good idea?  Seriously, Michael, the universe knows you are a sarcastic little shit, you don’t have to prove it at every opportunity! _

_ Michael turned and ducked down another random street.  He was probably going to have to use Google Maps to find his way home when this was all over. _

_ Rich’s voice had mostly faded by the time he reached the end of the street, but Michael found an old crumbling house, and after a moment's deliberation, decided he was going to duck inside anyway, just to be safe. _

_ Michael ran around to the back of the house and walked inside, looking over his shoulder. _

_ “Oh my God, I haven’t seen a person in forever!  Hi!” _

_ Michael whirled around at the voice to be met with— _

_ Okay, he was dreaming right?  Or high. Had he gotten high recently?  He didn’t think he’d gotten high recently enough that something like this should be happening.  Maybe he  _ should _ be high right now, maybe that would help him comprehend what he was seeing. _

_ Because the person in front of him was hovering about a foot above the ground.  Which was impossible. And all the stress from running from Rich which had been building up enough that whatever had just happened pushed him over the edge. _

_ Even half a year later, Michael would not be ashamed to say that he screamed at the top of his lungs like a little girl and ran out of the house. _

_ … _

_ He went back. _

_ Yeah, it was probably dumb, but Michael was an overly curious person. _

_ Okay, not really, but  _ come on, _ he had to know what the heck that was. _

_ He cautiously peeked his head around the corner to see the room was now empty.  Michael slowly stepped forward. “Uh, hello?” he called hesitantly. _

_ A head popped up through the floor, and Michael gave a little yelp. _

_ “No, no, wait please!” the boy called, flying through the floor until he was hovering right in front of him.  “I’m sorry, I really wasn’t trying to scare you yesterday. I just hadn’t seen another person in so long and—” _

_ Michael slowly started to walk forward again.  “Are you a ghost?” he asked. _

_ The boy nodded. _

_ “Woah,” Michael whispered.  “That is…” _

_ The boy bit his lip nervously. _

“…so cool!” _ Michael ran even closer.  “Oh my gosh, this is so amazing!  I was  _ just _ watching a documentary about ghost evidence!  Oh my— I’m Michael!” _

_ “Uh, J-Jeremy,” the boy said, floating backwards now.  “Are you gonna have a seizure or something?” _

_ “I have not ruled that out as a possibility!” Michael said with a grin.  “Oh my gosh oh my gosh, I have so many questions! How are you a ghost? How did you die?  Why are you in this random house?” _

_ “Uh, dude, I know just as much as you do.” Jeremy said.  “I don’t even remember how I died.” _

_ “Wait, really?” _

_ “Yeah.  The last thing I remember before suddenly I was here is meeting up with my best friend to go to school.” _

_ “Man, your last day alive was a school day.  That sucks.” _

_ “Uh…” _

_ “So you were just randomly floating here?” _

_ “Y-yeah?  It took me a couple days to calm down.  It helped when I realized I didn’t need to eat.  But I haven’t seen my dad or my friend Sean since I was alive.” _

_ “Woah… when was that?” _

_ “I have no clue!  What year is it?” _

_ “It’s 2015, man!” _

_ “I— I’ve been dead  _ 20 years?!”

_ “You’ve been here 20 years?!  Oh my gosh, that means you’ve missed 20 years of pop culture!” Michael cried happily.  “I have so much to show you! We’re gonna start with Netflix!” He pulled out his iPhone and walked over to Jeremy. _

_ “What— is that.” Jeremy said, pointing at the phone. _

_ Michael turned and looked at Jeremy for a few seconds. _

_ He clutched the phone gleefully to his chest.  “This is gonna be so much fun.” _

…

Michael had woken up in the middle of the night again.  It always took him a few seconds to grasp where he was and why he had woken up in the middle of the night, but usually the first thing that registered was that he was staring at the ceiling and that was not a good use of his time.

So then he would get up and get in his PT Cruiser and drive here.

Usually he would put the Whitney Houston record on and stare at the basement wall until he fell asleep.

_ The clock strikes upon the hour _

_ And the sun begins to fade _

Several hours later his 5:30 alarm would go off telling him to get back to his house or his moms would freak out when they saw he was gone.

The airport guards had called the police when they realized he was the missing kid, and the police had taken him to the station where his moms had shown up and hugged him like they were never going to see him again.  Michael hadn’t found the strength in him to hug back.

Christine’s parents hadn’t let her off of grounding in the past month, so Michael had barely seen her in that time.  The first time had been when Michael stopped by the day after and demanded Christine explain everything. She had, and then she had told him about Rich in the hospital.  Michael had easily slipped some Mountain Dew Red in his fruit punch. The hospital needed better security.

After that he had only seen Christine when she had managed to get a night of probation to come check on him.  That time had been spent in silence as they both watched some worthless documentary.

_ I’ve been in love and lost my senses _

Michael had missed a whole verse and chorus.

It was Christine’s footsteps Michael was currently hearing coming down the stairs.  Whose else could they be?

“How often are you here?” Christine said quietly, coming to sit next to Michael, whose gaze hadn’t moved from the wall.

Michael said nothing.

“Michael.”

Michael still said nothing.

“It’s okay.” Christine said.  “I get it. I sneak over here too.”

“If your parents catch you—”

“They won’t.  And in another week it won’t matter.  I’m finally almost un-grounded.”

_ Oh, I wanna dance with somebody _

_ I wanna feel the heat with somebody _

“I just feel… closer to him here?  I don’t know.” Christine said, and she sniffed.

_ Yeah, I wanna dance with somebody _

_ With somebody who loves me _

“Stop crying.”

Christine sniffed.  “What?”

“Stop crying!” Michael snapped.  “Why do you get to cry?!”

“Don’t you dare!” Christine screamed back, tears starting to fall.  She stopped. “I’m gonna miss him too.” That part was a whisper.

Michael sniffed once before the floodgates broke and he pulled his knees up to his chest and buried his head in them.  Christine hugged him from the side.

_ “‘m sorry,” _ Michael squeaked.

_ “It’s okay.” _ Christine said, her voice sounding just as bad.

They both sat there for a while, crying.  Eventually Christine took a deep shuddering breath and turned to look at Michael.  “Um, Rich told me to tell you—” she stopped and caught her breath again. “He’s inviting you to Pinkberry with all of his friends.  He says he tried to explain things to them, at least, the SQUIP part. He thinks Jake believes him. He thinks Brooke, Chloe, and Jenna are starting to.  And he’s inviting you tomorrow. I can’t go, but…”

“Why should I care?”

“He’s trying, Michael.  He really is trying to be better.”

“I don’t care if he’s trying to— Christine, you cannot imagine how little I care about Richard Goranski, one way or the other.”

“Don’t you dare isolate yourself, Michael Mell.”

“Who says I’m isolating myself?”

“Analyn and Rachel.”

Michael paused.  “Fair enough.” he muttered.

“Go to Pinkberry.”

“Okay.”

_ Don’tcha wanna dance say you wanna dance don’tcha wanna dance _

_ Don’tcha wanna dance say you wanna dance don’tcha wanna dance _

_ Don’tcha wanna dance say you wanna dance _

_ “With somebody who loves me,” _ Christine sung quietly in her angel voice.

If there was a gun sitting next to Michael he would have shot the record.

“How am I not supposed to wait for him?” Michael asked.  “How am I not supposed to say: ‘I love you, Jeremy, and there will never be anyone else, and I’ll wait for you?’”

“That’s what everyone in a good romance story says.” Christine said.  “Until the next person they fall in love with comes along.”

“You take that back.”

“I won’t.”

Michael said nothing.

Michael and Christine fell asleep leaning against each other that night until Michael’s alarm woke them both up and they went home.

That afternoon Michael went to Pinkberry with a group of people who talked too loud and didn’t know anything about the things Michael liked.  But he figured he’d probably fall in love with them (platonically) anyway, because as they were leaving Brooke walked up to him and gave him a hug because “You looked like you needed it.”, Jake gave him a strong clap on the back and said something about wanting to see his soda collection sometime, Chloe gave him this little smirk that made Michael realize their senses of humor were going to collaborate beautifully, Jenna bought him an extra frozen yogurt because “Brooke’s right, you need it,” and Rich, looking the most humble Michael had ever seen him, walked up to him, quietly apologized for the first of many times, thanked him for the Mountain Dew Red, and said Christine had said something about someone being dead with a SQUIP, and he thought he had some idea of what she meant, and if for some reason Michael ever needed to talk, he would be there.

Michael watched the group of five all leave, and his main thought was that yeah, maybe he wouldn’t mind hanging out with them again, even if someone would always be missing.

Michael, though he didn’t know this yet, would not waste any time becoming close with this new group of people (and neither would Christine).  Brooke would quickly become a confidant. He would stay very close to all of them throughout his life, but none of them would quite have the bond with him Christine did.

Even when, almost a decade and a half down the line, Michael did fall for someone else, as much as a bumpy, self-loathing filled road that was, his husband would never quite understand the closeness Michael had with Christine, though he would adore her too.

The SQUIPs were eventually all found and disposed of, and Michael hadn’t even been properly able to explain his burning, intense feelings to 100% let the cops handle it.  He did have to show up in the court case against Sean Hart, though, and Christine and his other friends would be there through it all.

And if Michael and Christine sometimes asked each other about how Jeremy (no one except Rich had any clue who they were talking about) would feel about how their lives had gone, that was just another inside joke no one else got, more evidence of how close they were.

And if Michael happened to one day have a son, and like the name Jeremy, well.

That was neither here nor there.


End file.
